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OY8  C    01  i3S 


Great  Missionaries 


Selh  ^.  Brain 


tihvavy  of  t:he  t:Keolo0ical  ^tminary 

PRINCETON  •  NEW  JERSEY 
PRESENTED  BY 

Delavan  L.    Pierson 

BV  2087  .B73 

Brain,  Belle  Marvel,  1859- 

1933. 
Love  stories  of  great 


z_^ 


*^'»5tst>>^ 


LOVE  STORIES  OF 
GREAT  MISSIONARIES 


BY  BELLE   M.  BRAIN 


Adventures  With  Four-Footed  Folk 

And  Other  Creatures  of  the  Animal  World 

Illustrated,  12mo,  cloth,  net  |1.00. 
No  one  is  able  to  detect  an  interesting  storv  more 
quickly  than  Miss  Brain.  In  her  latest  work  sne  has 
selected  some  of  the  most  thrilling  stories  from  the 
mission  field  dealing  with  animals  of  all  sorts,  from 
Edgerton  R,  Young's  sledge  dogs  in  the  Northwest  to 
the  man-eating  tiger  in  India. 

All  About  Japan 

A  Young  People's  History  of  Japan.  Illus- 
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"Miss  Brain  incorporates  in  a  style  peculiarly  adapted 
to  the  juvenile  mind,  a  great  variety  of  interesting 
facts  concerning  the  history,  life,  customs  and  man- 
ners of  the  Japanese,  as  well  as  brief  biographies  of 
some  of  the  most  successful  of  those  who  nave  given 
themselves  to  the  task  of  spreading  the  gospel  of 
Christ  throughout  the  is\znds/'—Liierary  Digest. 

The  Transformation  of  Hawaii 

How  American  Missionaries  gave  a  Chris- 
tian Nation  to  the  World.  Illustrated. 
12mo,  cloth  net  $1.00 

"It  is  remarkable  that  one  who  has  not  been  9n  the 
ground  should  have  attained  such  a  comprehension  of 
the  subject  as  a  whole,  and  such  accuracy  of  detail.  I 
am  in  a  position  to  judge  of  these  points,  having  lived 
there  nearly  all  my  life."— /"rfl/.  W.  D.  Alexander, 
author  of  ''A  Brief  History  of  the  Hawaiian  People." 

Missionary  Readings   for  Missionary  Pro- 
grams 

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"Appreciating  the  wealth  of  thrilling  incident  to  be 
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that  generally  these  are  not  written  in  proper  form 
for  public  readings,  Miss  Brain  has  made  extremely 
interesting  extracts  from  missionary  volumes.  The 
selections  cover  all  the  prominent  missionary  coun- 
tries."—CAWj^/an  Endeavor  World, 

Fifty  Missionary  Stories 

16mo,  cloth,  net  60c. 

"Selections  from  a  great  variety  of  missionary  books, 
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readings,  but  not  at  all  lacking  in  interest  and  impor- 
tance.''—-C/tri-rfian  Intelligencer. 


LOVE  STORIES  OF 
GREAT  MISSIONARIES 


By 
BELLE  M.  BRAIN 

Author  of  ^^All  About  Japan^  "  ^^Ad-ventures  ivith 

Four-Footed  Folky '  *  "  Transformation 

of  Haiuaiiy'"'  etc. 


New  York  Chicago  Toronto 

Fleming   H.    Revell    Company 

London     and     Edinburgh 


Copyright,   1913,  by 
FLEMING  H.  REVELL  COMPANY 


New  York  :  158  Fifth  Avenue 
Chicago  :  125  North  Wabash  Ave. 
Toronto  :  25  Richmond  Street,  W. 
London  :  21  Paternoster  Square 
Edinburgh  :     100    Princes    Street 


TO  THE  GIRL 

IVHO  IS  TEMPTED  TO  SAY 

"NO'' 

TO  HER  LOVER  BECAUSE  HE  IS  A 

STUDENT  VOLUNTEER 


FOREWORD. 

AT  the  Ohio  State  Christian  Endeavor 
Convention  held  in  Zanesville  in  1912,  it 
was  the  privilege  of  the  writer  to  conduct 
the  conferences  on  the  work  of  the  missionary 
committee.  At  one  of  these,  after  stating  the 
causes  that  had  led  a  number  of  great  mission- 
aries to  the  field,  the  young  people  were  asked 
to  teU  what  had  given  them  their  own  interest 
in  missions.  Many  life-stories  were  told  and  a 
deep  impression  was  made. 

That  evening,  in  personal  conversation  with 
the  writer,  a  prominent  minister  who  had  been 
present  at  the  conference  in  the  afternoon,  con- 
fessed that  he  had  expected  to  be  a  missionary 
but  that  his  fiancee  (at  that  time  his  wife)  was 
unwilling  to  go  and  he  had  given  it  up  for  her 
sake.  Next  morning  another  prominent  minister 
made  the  same  statement. 

What  did  it  mean?  Here  were  two  pastors, 
both  highly  successful  in  their  work,  lost  to  the 
foreign  field  because  being  a  missionary  would 
have  interfered  with  their  human  affections. 
Were  there  others  who  had  rejected  the  call  for 
like  reasons?  Alas,  that  their  name  should  be 
legion ! 


Foreword 

Investigation  has  proved,  what  every  mission 
board  secretary  knows  to  his  sorrow,  that  many 
a  young  volunteer,  pledged  to  foreign  missions, 
turns  aside  from  his  life-work  because  of  some 
love  affair.  The  call  of  Love,  clashing  with  the 
call  of  God,  proves  the  stronger.  Yet,  per- 
chance. Love's  call  was  of  God  as  much  as  the 
call  to  the  field,  and  through  faith,  patience,  and 
prayer,  might  have  been  brought  into  harmony 
with  it. 

It  was  in  the  hope  of  helping  young  people 
to  solve  aright  the  problem  of  marriage  and  mis- 
sions that  these  love  stories  of  great  missionaries 
were  searched  out  and  written.  Last  year  they 
found  publication  in  the  columns  of  The  Sunday 
School  Times.  Now,  through  the  courtesy  and 
kindness  of  the  editors  of  The  Times,  they  form 
the  chapters  of  this  little  book.  God  grant  they 
may  be  blest  as  they  go  forth  on  their  mission 
again. 

It  must  not  be  imagined  that  these  love  stories 
are  the  only  ones  in  the  history  of  missions  worth 
telling.  There  are  others  just  as  heroic.  These 
were  selected  because  each  represents  a  different 
type  and  impresses  a  much  needed  lesson. 

Belle  M.  Brain. 

Schenectady,  N.  Y. 


CONTENTS 

I.     Winning  a  Wife  in  the  Homeland        11     ^  t^-p  So 


II.     A  Case  of  Parental  Objection      .         21     i 


III.  Finding  a  Wife  on  the  Field  .  31   \       ^ 

IV.  A  Courtship  by  Correspondence    .  40  ^    *      ^ 

V.     The  Call  of  God  in  an  Offer  of  \  ^ 

Marriage 


2?r" 


51  ^^JT^Mj^ 


VI.     The  Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  At- 
tachment .  •  .        62  W\  o/CC 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

Sailing  of  Judson  and  His  Bride  on  the 
Caravan  from  Salem,  Mass.,  February 
19,  1812  .  .  .      Frontispiece 

Adoniram  Judson  and  Ann  Hasseltine 

(Judson  at  the  age  of  twenty-three)  .         11 

Robert  Moffat  and  Mary  Smith.    From 

miniatures  taken  at  the  age  of  twenty         .         22 

Robert  and  Mary  Moffat.     After  more 

than  fifty  years  in  Africa  .  ,         30 

David  Livingstone  and  His  Daughter 
Agnes     .  .  .  .  .39 

James  Gilmour     .  .  .  .48 

Monsieur  and  Madame  Coillard  .         55 

Henry  Martyn     .  .  .  .70 


o 


S 
^ 
A 


WINNING  A  WIFE  IN  THE  HOMELAND 

THE  first  time  Adoniram  Judson  saw  Ann 
Hasseltine  his  whole  heart  went  out  to 
her.  It  was  a  genuine  case  of  love  at 
first  sight. 

And  no  wonder.  In  every  way  she  was 
^rthy  of  the  love  of  such  a  young  man.  Tall 
and  slender,  with  dark  eyes  and  curling  hair, 
and  a  bright,  vivacious  manner,  she  was  not  only 
beautiful,  but  had  the  added  charms  of  a  keen 
and  well  developed  mind,  and  a  spirit  as  daunt- 
less and  devout  as  Judson 's  own. 

It  was  during  the  sessions  of  the  Massachu- 
setts General  Association  of  Congregational 
Churches  held  in  Bradford  in  June,  1810 — that 
historic  meeting  at  which  the  American  Board 
was  bom — that  the  two  first  met.  Ann  lived  in 
Bradford,  and  Adoniram  had  come,  in  company 
with  the  three  Samuels,  Newell,  Nott,  and 
Mills,  to  present  a  paper  to  the  Association  stat- 
ing their  desire  to  become  missionaries,  and  ask- 
ing if  they  might  expect  support  from  the  Amer- 
ican churches. 

The  story  of  their  first  meeting  is  told  by  Jud- 
son's  son:  ''During  the  sessions  the  ministers 
11 


12    Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

gathered  for  a  dinner  beneath  Mr.  Hasseltine's 
hospitable  roof.     His  youngest  daughter,  Ann, 
was  waiting  on  the  table.    Her  attention  was  at- 
tracted to  the  young  student  whose  bold  mission- 
ary projects  were  making  such  a  stir.    But  what 
was  her  surprise  to  observe,  as  she  moved  about 
the  table,  that  he  seemed  completely  absorbed  in 
his  plate !    Little  did  she  dream  that  she  had  al- 
V  ready  woven  her  spell  about  his  young  heart, 
I  and  that  he  was,  at  that  very  time,  composing 
r  a  graceful  stanza  in  her  praise ! ' ' 

An  introduction  followed,  and  ere  long  Jud- 
son  asked  her  if  she  would  be  his  wife  and  go 
with  him  to  carry  the  gospel  to  the  heathen  in 
India. 

It  was  a  momentous  question,  which  she  did 
not  answer  at  once.  In  every  way  he  was  such 
an  one  as  she  would  choose.  Slender  and  re- 
fined-looking, with  dark  eyes  and  chestnut  hair 
much  like  her  own,  the  son  of  a  highly  respected 
New  England  minister,  and  first  honor  man  at 
Brown  in  1807,  any  young  woman  might  have 
been  proud  to  be  offered  his  hand,  and  Ann  re- 
turned his  affection.  Had  he  been  content  to 
Btay  in  America  and  serve  the  **  biggest  church 
in  Boston,"  whose  minister  wanted  him  for  a 
coUeague,  it  would  not  have  taken  her  long  to 
decide.  But  to  go  with  him  to  India, — that  was 
another  question. 


Winniiig  a  Wife  in  tlie  Homeland    13 

It  is  hard  to  realize  in  these  days  what  it 
meant  to  be  a  missionary  then.  No  one  had  as 
yet  left  America  to  carry  the  Gospel  to  India, 
and  public  opinion  was  against  it.  For  a  man 
it  was  regarded  as  absurd;  for  a  woman  "en- 
tirely inconsistent  with  prudence  and  delicacy. ' ' 
The  voyage  was  long  and  perilous,  the  climate 
of  India  unfavorable,  and  the  danger  of  violent 
death  at  the  hands  of  the  natives  believed  to  be 
great.  Then,  too,  the  engagement  was  for  life, 
with  no  provision  for  furlough. 

No  wonder  Ann  hesitated.  It  does  not  cost 
quite  so  much  to  be  a  missionary  in  these  days, 
yet  many  a  young  woman,  asked  the  question 
that  Adoniram  asked  Ann,  even  though  her 
heart  prompts  an  afjrmative  answer,  either  re- 
jects the  suit  of  her  lover,  or  uses  all  her  powers 
of  persuasion  to  induce  him  to  remain  in  the 
homeland  with  her. 

Not  so  Ann  Hasseltine.  Though  the  idea  ap- 
palled her,  she  bravely  faced  it  and  sought  to 
know  whether  it  was  really  God's  call.  Most 
of  her  friends  were  violently  opposed  to  her 
going,  and  of  the  few  to  whom  she  turned  for 
advice,  only  two  or  three  gave  her  any  encour- 
agement whatever.  Though  Judson's  whole 
heart  was  set  on  her  going,  he  made  no  effort 
to  bias  her  decision  by  minimizing  the  dangers 
or  throwing  a  false  glamor  of  romance  over  the 


14   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

future,  but  appealed  instead  to  her  love  for 
Christ  and  the  rewards  promised  to  those  who 
serve  Him.  "When  at  len^h  she  said  **  some- 
thing about  the  consent  of  parents,"  he  wrote 
to  her  father  as  follows: 

**I  have  now  to  ask  whether  you  can  consent 
to  part  with  your  daughter  early  next  spring,  to 
see  her  no  more  in  this  world?  Whether  you 
can  consent  to  her  departure  to  a  heathen  land, 
and  the  hardships  and  sufferings  of  a  mission- 
ary life?  Whether  you  can  consent  to  her  ex- 
posure to  the  dangers  of  the  ocean ;  to  the  fatal 
influence  of  the  southern  climate  of  India;  to 
every  kind  of  want  and  distress;  to  degrada- 
tion, insult,  persecution,  and  perhaps  a  violent 
death  ?  Can  you  consent  to  all  this  for  the  sake 
of  Him  who  left  His  heavenly  home  and  died  for 
her  and  for  you ;  for  the  sake  of  perishing  and 
immortal  souls;  for  the  sake  of  Zion  and  the 
glory  of  God?  Can  you  consent  to  all  this  in 
the  hope  of  soon  meeting  your  daughter  in  the 
world  of  glory,  with  a  crown  of  righteousness 
brightened  by  the  acclamations  of  praise  which 
shall  redound  to  her  Saviour  from  heathen  saved, 
through  her  means,  from  eternal  wo  and  de- 
spair?" 

It  was  an  honest  and  honorable  letter,  though 
scarcely  adapted,  in  the  eyes  of  the  world,  to 
gaining  its  end.  Few  fathers  would  consent  to 


Winning  a  Wife  in  the  Homeland    15 

a  daughter  entering  upon  such  a  career.  But 
the  spirit  of  obedience  to  the  divine  will  was 
as  strong  in  Mr.  Hasseltin-e's  heart  as  in  that 
o'-  Ann  and  her  lover.  If  God  wanted  his 
daughter,  dear  though  she  was  to  him,  he  would 
not  withhold  her. 

And  so  they  were  betrothed, — ^the  earnest 
young  student  volunteer  of  twenty-two  who  had 
already  done  so  much  for  missions,  and  the  fair 
girl  of  twenty-one  to  whom  belongs  the  honor 
of  being  the  first  American  woman  to  decide  to 
go  as  a  missionary  to  the  heathen  of  Asia.  Be 
it  not  thought  this  decision  was  made  merely 
because  of  her  love  for  young  Judson.  In  a 
letter  to  an  intimate  girl  friend,  dated  Septem- 
ber 8,  1810,  she  thus  states  her  motives : 

**I  have  ever  made  you  a  confidant.  I  will 
still  confide  in  you,  and  beg  for  your  prayers, 
that  I  may  be  directed  in  regard  to  this  subject 
I  shall  communicate. 

' '  I  feel  williQg  and  expect,  if  nothing  in  provi- 
dence prevents,  to  spend  my  days  in  this  world 
in  heathen  lands.  Yes,  Lydia,  I  have  about 
come  to  the  determination  to  give  up  all  my  com- 
forts and  enjoyments  here,  sacrifice  my  affection 
to  relatives  and  friends,  and  go  where  God,  in 
his  providence,  shall  see  fit  to  place  me.  My  de- 
terminations are  not  hasty,  or  formed  without 
viewing  the  dangers,  trials,  and  hardships  at- 


16   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

tenaant  on  a  missionary  life.  Nor  were  my  de- 
terminations formed  in  consequence  of  an  at- 
tachment to  an  earthly  object;  but  with  a  sense 
of  my  obligation  to  God,  and  a  full  conviction 
of  its  being  a  call  in  providence,  and  conse- 
quently my  duty.  My  feelings  have  been  ex- 
quisite in  regard  to  the  subject.  Now  my  mind 
is  settled  and  composed,  and  is  willing  to  leave 
the  event  with  God — none  can  support  one  un- 
der trials  and  afflictions  but  Him.  In  Him 
alone  I  feel  a  disposition  to  confide. 

*'How  short  is  time,  how  boundless  is  eterni- 
ty! If  we  may  be  considered  worthy  to  suffer 
for  Jesus  here,  will  it  not  enhance  our  happiness 
hereafter?  0  pray  for  me.  Spend  whole  even- 
ings in  prayer  for  those  who  go  to  carry;  the 
gospel  to  the  poor  heathen.** 

It  must  have  been  rather  a  solemn  affair,  this 
courtship  of  Adoniram  and  Ann.  It  could  not 
be  otherwise  with  the  Puritan  spirit  still  so 
strong  in  New  England.  At  that  time,  and  in- 
deed for  long  after,  levity  was  considered  most 
unbecoming  in  a  missionary,  and  the  fitness  of 
a  candidate  who  indulged  in  much  laughter  was 
seriously  questioned.  Yet  neither  Ann  nor 
Adoniram  was  by  nature  serious  and  sober.  Up 
to  the  time  of  her  conversion  in  her  seventeenth 
year,  Ann  had  been  the  gayest  of  the  gay,  de- 
lighting in  an  endless  round  of  parties,  and  re- 


Winning  a  Wife  in  the  Homeland    17 

garding  herself  as  entirely  too  old  to  say  her 
prayers!  And  Adoniram,  becoming  tainted 
with  French  infidelity  through  association  with 
a  gay  and  witty  college  chum,  had  started  out 
to  see  the  world,  and  while  seeing  it  had  fallen 
in  with  a  band  of  strolling  players,  whose  wild 
and  vagabond  life  he  shared  for  a  time. 

But  now  they  were  as  devout  and  as  discreet 
as  any  one  could  wish.  Of  the  frequent  letters 
that  passed  between  them,  the  three  that  have 
been  given  to  the  public — letters  of  Adoniram 
to  Ann,  dated  respectively  December  30  and  31, 
1810,  and  January  1,  1811 — show  a  complete 
consecration  to  God.  That  of  New  Year's  Day 
pictures  in  such  realistic  terms  the  sorrows  that 
may  overtake  them  during  the  year  that  it  is 
a  wonder  Ann  did  not  break  the  engagement  at 
once !  But  it  breathes  a  spirit  of  true  love  for 
her,  and  is  not  without  its  playful  touch.  Long- 
ing to  be  united  to  her  and  eager  to  begin  his 
great  work,  he  expresses  the  wish  that  this  may 
be  the  year  in  which  she  will  change  her  name 
and  they  will  cross  the  ocean  and  dwell  in 
heathen  lands  together. 

Not  until  the  following  year  were  these  wishes 
fulfiUed.  On  September  11,  1811,  Messrs.  Jud- 
son.  Hall,  Newell,  and  Nott  (Luther  Rice  was 
later  added  to  the  number)  received  their  ap- 
pointment as  missionaries  from  the  Board,  but 


18   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

as  opportunities  for  obtaining  passage  to  India 
were  of  rare  occurrence  in  those  days,  no  time 
was  set  for  their  departure. 

At  length  the  way  unexpectedly  opened.  In 
January,  1812,  it  was  found  that  two  ships  were 
about  to  sail  for  Calcutta,  the  Harmony  from 
Philadelphia  and  the  Caravan  from  Salem,  and 
that  by  dividing  the  missionaries  iato  two  par- 
ties, passage  could  be  secured  for  them  all. 

The  time  was  short  and  there  were  many  prep- 
arations to  make,  but  at  length  all  was  ready. 
On  February  5  there  was  a  quiet  wedding  at 
Bradford,  and  an  agonizing  parting,  as  Ann 
and  Adoniram  Judson  went  forth,  expecting 
never  more  to  return.  The  next  day,  at  a  sol- 
emn and  affecting  service  held  in  the  old  Taber- 
nacle Church  at  Salem,  where  a  picture  of  the 
scene  and  the  settee  on  which  they  sat  are  still 
preserved,  Judson  and  his  colleagues  received 
ordination.  Then,  on  February  19,  after  an  un- 
expected delay  of  some  days,  the  Judsons,  in 
company  with  Samuel  and  Harriet  Newell, 
boarded  the  Caravan  and  began  their  wedding 
journey  to  the  field. 

It  was  well  they  had  counted  the  cost.  The 
trials  in  store  for  them,  though  of  a  somewhat 
different  nature,  were  fully  as  great  as  they  had 
anticipated.  Contrary  to  aU  expectation,  the 
ocean  voyage  was  completed  without  disaster; 


Winning  a  Wife  in  the  Homeland    19 

neither  of  them  met  with  a  violent  death  at  the 
hands  of  the  heathen;  and  each,  in  the  good 
providence  of  God,  was  permitted  to  return  once 
to  the  homeland. 

But  the  expulsion  from  India ;  the  separation 
from  their  colleagues,  and  the  odium  cast  on 
their  names  resulting  from  their  change  of  be- 
lief in  regard  to  the  method  of  baptism;  their 
settlement  in  Burma,  a  land  they  had  been  led 
to  regard  with  feelings  of  horror;  and  the 
twenty-one  months'  imprisonment  at  Ava  and 
Oung-pen-la — these  were  things  they  had  not 
even  dreamed  of. 

But,  though  God  permitted  them  to  suffer  so 
sorely,  He  gave  them  abundant  success.     Many 
notable  men  and  women  have  gone  out  since 
from  America,  but  the  service  of  these  two  has 
not    yet    been    surpassed  —  perhaps    not    even 
equaled.     In  that  dark  land  they  dreaded  to 
enter,  Judson  planted  one  of  the  most  famous  f 
and  successful  of  missions,  and  his  wife  proved  1 
herself  one  of  the  world's  greatest  heroines.    The  ' 
change  in  denomination  that  cost  them  so  sore  I 
resulted  in  the  forming  of  a  second  great  mis-  " 
sionary  society  in  America, — the  society  so  long 
known    as    the    American    Baptist    Missionary 
Union, — and  the  recital  of  their  sufferings  at 
Ava  kindled  fires  of  heroic  self-sacrifice  that 
have  never  died  out. 


20   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

God  evidently  made  no  mistake  when  He  gave 
Ann  Hasseltine  to  Adoniram  Judson  to  be  his 
wedded  wife.  "Without  her  at  his  side  to  cheer 
and  comfort  and  help  him,  it  would  have  been 
hard  to  plant  the  mission  in  Burma,  and  seem- 
ingly impossible  for  him  to  have  endured  the 
tortures  at  Ava. 


II 

A  CASE  OF  PARENTAL  OBJECTION 

NOT  long  after  Robert  Moffat  entered  the 
service  of  James  Smith,  of  the  Dukin- 
field  Nurseries,  he  fell  in  love  with  his 
employer's  only  daughter. 

The  father  had  been  afraid  this  might  hap- 
pen. Returning  home  from  Manchester  on  that 
eventful  day  when  he  had  promised  his  friend, 
the  Rev.  William  Roby,  to  take  into  his  employ 
the  young  Scotch  gardener  who  felt  called  of 
God  to  be  a  missionary,  it  suddenly  occurred  to 
him  that  perhaps  it  would  cost  him  his  daughter. 

But  Mr.  Roby  was  so  anxious  to  have  his 
young  protege  near  him,  and  there  had  been 
no  other  opening.  Besides,  James  Smith  liked 
the  young  man  and  thought  he  would  make  a 
good  workman. 

Perhaps  there  was  no  ground  for  his  fears, 
after  all.  The  young  man  had  been  obliged  to 
give  up  his  plans,  at  least  for  the  present.  The 
London  Society  to  whom  he  had  offered  himself, 
through  Mr.  Roby,  had  declined  to  accept  him. 
There  were  so  many  applicants  that  only  the 
best  could  be  sent,  and  young  Moffat  had  had 
little  schooling. 

21 


22   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

End  as  it  might,  James  Smith  had  given  his 
word,  and  he  would  staad  by  it.  So,  about  New 
Year's,  1816,  Robert  Moffat  began  work  at 
the  Dukinfield  Nurseries. 

Very  soon  he  made  the  acquaintance  of  his 
master's  young  daughter.  Beautiful  in  face, 
polished  in  manners,  and  the  expectant  of  a  con- 
siderable fortune,  she  was  attractive  enough  to 
win  the  heart  of  any  young  man.  To  her 
father's  new  assistant  she  had  the  added  charm 
of  an  interest  in  missions  as  deep  as  his  own. 
Her  education  in  a  Moravian  school  had  laid 
the  foundations;  and  two  years  before,  at  a 
meeting  in  Manchester,  she  had  been  so  deeply 
impressed  with  the  needs  of  the  heathen  that 
she  had  sent  up  a  silent  petition  to  God  that 
some  time  she  might  be  permitted  to  work  in 
South  Africa. 

From  the  first  Robert  Moffat  and  Mary  Smith 
were  thrown  much  together.  Ere  long  they  be- 
came so  deeply  attached  that  they  plighted  their 
troth  one  to  another. 

For  a  time  the  course  of  their  true  love  ran 
smooth.  But  by  and  by  there  was  trouble. 
Through  the  intervention  of  Mr.  Roby,  the  Di- 
rectors in  London  were  induced  to  reconsider 
their  decision,  and  bade  the  young  Scotchman 
be  ready  to  sail  within  a  few  months.  He  was 
assigned  at  first  to  the  South  Seas  with  John 


<  bo 


S.2 


A  Case  of  Parental  Objection       23 

Williams.  But  presently,  deeming  *'tliae  twa 
lads  ower  young  to  gang  tegeither'' — Moffat 
was  twenty-one  and  Williams  twenty — this  was 
changed  to  South  Africa.  Thus  strangely  was 
God  preparing  to  answer  Mary  Smith's  prayer. 

To  his  parents  in  Scotland  his  going  was  a 
trial  of  no  common  sort.  Yet  they  did  nothing 
to  hinder,  but  bade  him  '^ Godspeed."  The  old 
father  wrote,  with  dignified  resignation,  that 
"whatever  might  be  his  own  feelings  or  those 
of  Robert's  mother,  they  dared  not  oppose  his 
design,  lest  haply  in  so  doing  they  should  be 
found  fighting  with  God." 

Not  so  Mary  Smith's  parents.  Both  were 
deeply  pious,  and  ardent  promoters  of  missions. 
Yet  they  declared  they  could  not  relinquish  their 
daughter  and  refused  to  give  their  consent. 

Poor  young  Moffat !  He  had  not  realized  that 
his  going  might  cost  him  so  much.  But  his  life 
had  been  laid  on  God's  altar,  and  he  would  not 
withdraw  it.  Nor  did  Mary  Smith  ask  it.  The 
idea  of  a  separation  appalled  them,  but  their 
happiness  must  not  interfere  with  God's  work. 
So  Robert  prepared  to  go  out  alone. 

By  and  by  a  letter  came  from  the  Directors 
that  made  it  still  harder.  *'A11  candidates  are 
expected  to  take  partners  along  with  them,"  it 
said.  This  was  a  new  sorrow  that  cost  Mary 
Smith  many  tears.     Yet  she  offered  to  release 


24   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

Robert  from  his  engagement,  and  let  him  choose 
another  to  go  in  her  place.  But  to  him  this 
seemed  little  short  of  a  crime.  How  could  he 
offer  his  hand  to  another  when  his  heart  was 
still  in  Mary  Smith's  keeping?  Yet  if  God 
willed  it,  he  must  obey. 

But  God  did  not  ask  this  sacrifice  of  him. 
*'From  the  clearest  indications  of  His  Provi- 
dence, He  bids  me  go  out  alone,"  he  wrote  to 
his  parents,  after  long  hours  of  prayer;  **and 
He  who  appoints  crosses  and  disappointments 
also  imparts  resignation  and  grace  sufficient 
unto  the  day.  So  I  am  bold  to  adopt  the  lan- 
guage of  Eli,  and  to  say,  'It  is  the  Lord,  let 
Him  do  what  seemeth  Him  good.'  " 

And  so  it  was  settled.  The  Directors  ac- 
quiesced in  the  decision,  and  on  October  18,  1816, 
when  Moffat  sailed  for  South  Africa,  leaving 
his  heart  in  old  England,  no  new  tie  had  been 
formed  to  separate  him  from  his  loved  one,  and 
there  was  nothing  to  prevent  his  claiming  his 
own  should  her  parents  ever  be  willing  to  sur- 
render her  to  him.  Sore  as  was  their  sorrow  at 
parting,  the  young  lovers  thanked  God  for  this. 

Moffat's  destination  in  Africa  was  Africaner's 
Kraal,  in  Namaqualand,  beyond  the  confines  of 
Cape  Colony,  where  the  Ebners  were  working. 
Africaner  was  the  terror  of  the  whole  region, 
and  all  along  the  way  from  Cape  Town,  the 


A  Case  of  Parental  Objection       25 

yoTing  missionary  heard  dire  predictions  of  the 
fate  that  awaited  him.  ''One  warned  me  that 
he  would  set  me  up  for  a  mark  for  his  boys  to 
shoot  at/'  he  says;  ''another,  that  he  would 
strip  off  my  skin  and  make  a  drum  of  it  to  dance 
to ;  another,  that  he  would  make  a  drinking  cup 
of  my  skull.  One  kind,  motherly  lady,  wiping 
the  tears  from  her  eyes,  bade  me  farewell,  say- 
ing, 'Had  you  been  an  old  man  it  would  have 
been  nothing,  for  you  would  soon  have  died, 
whether  or  no;  but  you  are  young,  and  going 
to  become  a  prey  to  that  monster.'  " 

But  when  Moffat  reached  the  Kraal,  Africaner 
seemed  glad  to  see  him  and  ordered  his  women 
to  build  him  a  house.  In  half  an  hour  they  had 
it  all  ready!  It  was  a  frail  structure,  in  shape 
like  a  bee-hive,  with  a  single  opening  large 
enough  to  crawl  in,  yet  he  lived  in  it  nearly  six 
months. 

Africaner's  heart  was  soon  won  and  the  work 
progressed  fairly  well,  but  life  in  the  little  hut 
was  lonely  and  comfortless.  Soon  after  Moffat 
arrived  the  Ebners  withdrew,  leaving  him  alone, 
with  no  prospect  of  reinforcement.  He  rarely 
saw  a  white  face,  and  for  nearly  a  year  did  not 
hear  a  word  spoken  in  English. 

Great  indeed  was  his  need  of  Mary  Smith's 
care.  "I  have  many  difficulties  to  encounter, 
being  alone,"  he  wrote  to  his  parents.    "No  one 


26   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

can  do  anything  for  me  in  my  household  affairs. 
I  must  attend  to  everything,  which  hinders  my 
work,  for  I  could  wish  to  have  almost  nothing  to 
to  do  but  instruct  the  heathen.  I  am  carpenter, 
smith,  cooper,  tailor,  shoemaker,  miller,  baker, 
and  housekeeper — the  last  the  most  burdensome. 
An  old  Namaqua  woman  milks  my  cow,  makes 
a  fire,  and  washes.  All  the  other  things  I  do 
myself,  though  I  seldom  prepare  anything  till 
impelled  by  hunger.  I  wish  many  times  my 
mother  saw  me.  My  house  is  always  pretty 
clean,  but  oh,  what  a  confusion  among  my  linen. '^ 

During  the  long  winter  evenings  at  the  old 
home  in  Scotland,  his  mother  had  taught  her 
boys  to  knit  and  sew,  while  she  told  them  thrill- 
ing stories  of  Moravian  missions.  Robert  had 
sometimes  rebelled,  but  now  he  was  glad,  for  he 
had  frequent  need  to  make  use  of  his  needle. 

Meanwhile  Mary  Smith  was  breaking  her 
heart,  far  away  in  old  England.  She  was  sure 
God  was  calling  her  to  Africa  and  was  afraid 
she  was  doing  wrong  not  to  go.  But  her  par- 
ents showed  no  signs  of  relenting. 

There  was  nothing  to  do  but  to  wait  and  to 
pray,  and  this  both  the  young  people  were  do- 
ing. Thousands  of  miles  lay  between  them,  yet 
their  prayers  were  ever  ascending  ia  united  pe- 
tition to  heaven. 

Their  great  solace  was  letters — long,   loving 


A  Case  of  Parental  Objection       27 

letters  that  kept  them  in  touch  with  each  other. 
But  on  November  26,  1818,  one  came  to  Robert 
in  Africa  that  he  was  not  glad  to  receive.  In 
it  his  dear  Mary  told  him,  with  sore  sorrow  of 
heart,  that  since  her  father  declared  he  would 
never  give  his  consent,  she  had  at  last  relin- 
quished all  hope  of  coming  to  Africa.  It  well- 
nigh  crushed  him,  yet  in  his  sorrow  he  drew 
closer  to  God. 

But  God  was  merely  testing  the  faith  of  His 
children,  and  their  prayers  had  been  heard  after 
all.  Less  than  a  month  later  Mary  Smithes  par- 
ents suddenly  and  unexpectedly  gave  their  con- 
sent to  her  going! 

**This  is  by  no  means  what  I  expected  a 
week  ago,"  she  wrote  to  Robert's  parents. 
"Previous  to  the  arrival  of  the  last  letters,  my 
father  persisted  in  saying  I  should  never  have 
his  consent ;  and  my  dear  mother  has  uniformly 
asserted  that  it  would  break  her  heart;  never- 
theless, they  both  yesterday  calmly  resigned  me 
into  the  hands  of  the  Lord,  declaring  th^y  durst 
no  longer  withhold  me." 

"When  the  news  reached  Robert  in  Africa  he 
wrote  to  his  parents  at  once:  ''I  have  just  re- 
ceived letters  from  Miss  Smith.  The  whole  scene 
is  changed.  I  have  now  reason  to  believe  that 
God  will  make  her  path  plain  to  Africa.    This, 


28   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

I  trust,  will  be  soon,  for  a  missionary  without  a 
wife  in  this  country  is  like  a  boat  with  one  oar. ' ' 

Mary  Smith  lost  no  time  in  preparing  to  go 
to  her  lover.  The  wedding,  of  course,  would 
take  place  in  Africa.  It  was  out  of  the  ques- 
tion for  Robert  to  come  for  his  bride.  It  was 
a  hard  journey  for  a  young  girl  to  take  all  alone, 
and  there  was  some  delay  in  securing  her  pas- 
sage; but  at  length,  on  September  7,  1819,  she 
boarded  the  *' British  Colony''  and  sailed  for 
the  Cape  in  the  care  of  a  minister  of  the  Dutch 
Church  and  his  wife. 

Be  it  not  thought  that  her  going  cost  her  no 
sorrow.  Eager  as  she  was  to  be  at  work  with 
Robert  in  Africa,  the  anguish  of  parting  with 
father  and  mother  and  brothers  was  almost  un- 
bearable. 

Meanwhile  in  Africa  Robert  was  being  put  to 
another  sore  test.  Early  in  1819,  Dr.  Philip  and 
Mr.  John  Campbell  arrived  from  London  to  in- 
spect the  various  stations,  and  begged  Moffat  to 
make  the  tour  with  them.  They  needed  his  help, 
but  it  would  take  nearly  a  year  and  prevent  his 
meeting  his  betrothed  when  she  landed  in  Africa. 
Was  it  his  duty  to  go?  Could  he  let  strangers 
meet  her,  even  though  they  were  dear  friends 
of  his?  But  God  had  been  good,  and  His  work 
must  be  first.  So  he  said  he  would  go,  and  God 
accepted  his  spirit  of  sacrifice  but  did  not  exact 


A  Case  of  Parental  Objection       29 

its  full  payment.  About  midway  in  the  journey 
war  broke  out  with  the  Kaffirs,  and  the  party 
had  to  turn  back,  bringing  Moffat  to  Cape  Town 
when  the  *' British  Colony"  swung  into  port. 

Their  meeting  was  very  affecting.  **My  cup 
of  happiness  seems  almost  full,"  Mary  Smith 
wrote  to  her  parents.  *'I  have  found  my  dear 
friend  all  that  my  heart  could  desire,  except  his 
being  almost  worn  out  with  anxiety,  and  his 
very  look  makes  my  heart  ache.  Our  worthy 
friend,  Melville,  met  me  on  board  and  conducted 
me  to  his  house,  where  a  scene  took  place  such  as 
I  never  wish  to  experience  again.  We  have  re- 
ceived each  other  from  the  Lord  and  are  happy." 

To  this  Robert  adds  in  the  same  letter :  *' When 
the  news  of  your  beloved  daughter's  arrival 
reached  me,  it  was  to  me  nothing  less  than  life 
from  the  dead.  My  prayers  were  answered,  and 
the  promises  which  had  long  been  my  refuge 
were  fulfilled.  Mary,  my  own  dear  Mary,  is 
now  far  distant  from  you;  but  let  this  comfort 
you,  that,  although  in  a  land  of  strangers,  she 
is  under  the  care  of  our  ever-present  God,  and 
united  to  one  who  promises  to  be  father,  mother, 
and  husband  to  her,  and  will  never  forget  the 
sacrifice  you  have  made  in  committing  to  his  care 
your  only  daughter." 

Three  weeks  later,  on  December  27,  1819,  the 
long-deferred  wedding  took  place  in  St.  George 's 


30   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

Church,  Cape  Town,  Dr.  Philip  taking  the  place 
of  the  absent  father,  and  the  Melvilles  opening 
their  house  for  the  feast.  Shortly  after,  the 
young  couple  left  in  ox- wagons  for  their  wedding 
journey  of  six  hundred  miles  to  their  field. 

Such  was  the  happy  ending  of  the  romance  of 
the  Moffats.  Theirs  was  a  union  truly  ideal. 
For  more  than  fifty  years  they  walked  hand  in 
hand,  doing  God's  work  with  a  zeal  that  has 
rarely  been  equaled. 

Through  it  all  Mary  Moffat  was  the  truest  of 
helpmeets.  ''My  father  never  would  have  been 
the  missionary  he  was  but  for  her  care,''  says 
their  son.  When  God  took  her  home,  the  sense 
of  her  loss  overwhelmed  her  poor  husband. 
"For  fifty-three  years  I  have  had  her  to  pray 
for  me, ' '  was  his  first  pitiful  cry  when  he  found 
she  was  gone.  But  what  a  precious  gift  of  God 
she  had  been! 


^£ 


Ill 

FINDING  A  WIFE  ON  THE  FIELD 

DAVID  LIVINGSTONE  was  fancy  free 
when  he  sailed  for  Africa  in  1840.  He 
had  ideas  of  his  owr.  on  the  subject  of 
matrimony  and  missions,  and  no  fair  young  girl 
crossing  his  path  had  as  yet  led  him  to  change 
them. 

The  Directors  of  the  London  Missionary  So- 
ciety had  asked  him  the  usual  questions  when  he 
applied  to  them  two  years  before.  One  of  them 
was  in  regard  to  his  matrimonial  prospects.  In 
answering  this  he  was  very  explicit.  * '  I  am  not 
married/'  he  said,  *'nor  under  any  engagement 
of  marriage,  nor  have  I  indeed  been  in  love !  I 
would  prefer  to  go  out  unmarried,  that  I  may, 
like  the  great  apostle,  be  without  family  cares, 
and  give  myself  entirely  up  to  the  work." 

His  interest  at  that  time  was  centered  in 
China,  but  the  Opium  War  broke  out  and  pre- 
vented his  going.  Just  then  Robert  Moffat  came 
home  and  won  him  for  Africa. 

Good,  motherly,  wise  Mary  Moffat  did  all  she 

could  to  persuade  him  to  marry.    She  could  not 

forget  what  her  own  Robert  had  suffered  in 

Africa  before  her  parents  allowed  her  to  go  to 

31 


32   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

him,  and  was  loath  to  see  another  young  man 
go  out  with  such  prospects.  But  Livingstone 
thought  he  knew  best  and  declin-ed  to  take  her 
advice. 

The  first  weeks  in  Africa  did  not  change  his 
opinion.  He  still  thought  he  had  done  well  to 
go  out  alone,  with  no  wife  to  hamper  his  move- 
ments. To  his  friend  "Watt,  a  missionary  in 
India,  who,  like  himself,  had  elected  to  go  out 
unmarried,  he  wrote,  soon  after  landing: 

"Mrs.  Sewall  writes  that  she  believes  you  are 
heartily  sorry  you  had  not  a  helpmate  with  you. 
I  have  told  her  I  am  sure  you  are  not.  I  am 
conscious  myself  that  I  am  better  without.  All 
the  missionaries'  wives  I  have  seen  denounce  my 
single  blessedness  in  no  measured  terms.  Some 
even  insinuated  that  the  reason  I  am  thus  is 
that  I  have  been  unable  to  get  a  spouse.  But  I 
put  that  down  very  speedily  by  assuming  that 
it  is  a  great  deal  easier  for  a  missionary  to  get 
married  in  England  than  to  come  out  single. 
In  the  latter  case  a  vigorous  resistance  must  be 
made,  but  in  the  former  only  yield  up  the  affair 
into  the  hands  of  any  friend,  and  it  is  managed 
for  you  in  a  twinkling!  This  is  a  digression, 
but  perhaps  it  may  come  in  seasonably  if  your 
colleague 's  spouse  is  hard  on  you. ' ' 

But  bachelor  life  in  Africa  did  not  prove  the 
ideal  thing  he  had  thought  it.    Seeing  none  but 


Finding  a  Wife  on  the  Field         33 

black  faces  for  weeks  at  a  time  gave  him  a  great 
sense  of  loneliness;  and  being  his  own  house- 
keeper, laundress,  and  seamstress  was  hard  work 
and  took  up  too  much  of  his  time.  Besides, 
there  was  work  for  the  women  and  children  that 
only  a  woman  could  do. 

After  three  years  of  roughing  it,  he  began  to 
wonder  if  marrying  for  a  missionary  was  such 
a  bad  thing  after  all.  Perhaps,  if  he  could  find 
the  right  kind  of  wife,  he  might  do  it  himself 
after  all — ^not  now,  but  some  time  far  off  in  the 
future. 

A  letter  from  Watt  put  his  mind  on  it  harder 
than  ever.  From  the  '  *  apologetic-f or-marriage 
strain"  in  which  it  was  writt-en,  Livingstone  in- 
ferred that  his  friend  was  about  to  marry,  and 
wrote  him  as  follows: 

* '  I  hope  you  will  be  happy.  Here  there  is  no 
one  worth  taking  off  one 's  hat  to.  Daughters  of 
missionaries  have  miserably  contracted  ininds. 
Colonial  ladies  are  worse.  There's  no  outlet  for 
me  when  I  begin  to  think  of  getting  married 
than  that  of  sending  home  an  advertisement  for 
the  Evangelical  Magazine,  and  if  I  get  old  it 
must  be  for  some  decent  sort  of  widow.  In  the 
meantime  I  am  too  busy  to  think  of  anything 
of  the  kind." 

The  next  year  a  dreadful  thing  happened. 
Livingstone's  station  at  Mabotsa,  two  hundred 


34   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

miles  northeast  of  Moffat's  station  at  Kuruman, 
was  infested  with  lions  which  did  a  great  deal 
of  damage.  Nine  sheep  were  killed  in  one  day, 
and  Livingstone  started  out  with  the  natives  to 
put  an  end  to  the  lions. 

But  iQstead  of  Livingstone's  killing  a  lion,  a 
lion  nearly  killed  him.  Springing  on  him  un- 
awares from  the  bush,  it  caught  him  by  the 
shoulder  and  shook  his  as  a  terrier  dog  shakes 
a  rat.  His  life  was  saved  by  a  kind  of  miracle, 
but  the  bones  of  his  arm  were  crunched  and 
broken,  and  the  flesh  torn  in  a  terrible  manner. 

In  this  pitable  condition  his  thoughts  turned 
to  Kuruman  as  affording  the  best  haven  of  rest 
near  at  hand.  No  place  in  Africa  could  seem 
so  much  like  a  home  to  him.  For  three  years, 
while  the  Moffats  were  absent  in  England,  it 
had  been  his  headquarters,  and  now  the  Moffats 
were  back.  He  had  ridden  a  hundred  and  fifty 
miles  on  horseback  to  meet  them  on  their  way 
up  from  the  Cape  a  few  months  before.  So  to 
Kuruman  he  went  to  rest  and  recuperate. 

Notwithstanding  the  pain,  he  found  himself 
greatly  enjoying  his  visit.  Doctor  and  Mrs. 
Moffat  were  both  very  kind  to  him;  and  Mary 
and  Ann,  their  charming  young  daughters, 
whose  education,  begun  at  the  Cape,  had  been 
completed  in  England,  soon  led  him  to  feel  that 
there  were,   after  all,  young  ladies   in  Africa 


Finding  a  Wife  on  the  Field         35 

*Vorth  taking  off  his  hat  to"!  Ere  long  his 
prejudice  against  the  daughters  of  missionaries 
vanished  away,  and  presently  the  last  remnants 
of  his  long-cherished  objections  to  marriage  dis- 
appeared likewise.  Finding  in  Mary,  the  elder, 
his  ideal  of  a  wife,  he  (to  use  his  own  words) 
*' screwed  up  courage  to  put  a  question  beneath 
one  of  the  fruit-trees,"  the  answer  to  which 
being  *'Yes,"  the  two  were  betrothed. 

Livingstone  had  found  his  heart  at  last.  Yet 
he  had  not  obeyed  its  dictates  without  due  de- 
liberation. He  had  so  long  regarded  a  wife  as 
a  hindrance  that  he  dared  not  *'put  the  ques- 
tion beneath  the  fruit-tree"  without  carefully 
consideriQg  what  effect  it  might  have  on  his 
future  career  as  a  missionary.  This  he  made 
plain  in  a  letter  to  the  Directors  announcing 
that  he  had  at  last  decided  to  marry. 

Without  doubt  his  choice  was  a  wdse  one.  Had 
he  searched  the  world  over  he  could  not  have 
found  a  more  suitable  bride  than  the  one  God 
had  ready  in  Africa.  Born  and  bred  in  the 
country,  adept  in  all  the  arts  of  the  household, 
and  already  at  work  in  the  mission,  she  had 
every  qualification  for  the  wife  of  a  pioneer  mis- 
sionary such  as  Livingstone  then  expected  to  be. 
At  the  same  time,  she  had  the  culture  and  re- 
finement that  made  her  an  acceptable  companion 
for  a  man  of  such  scholarly  bent. 


36   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

Livingstone  was  jubilant  over  the  prke  lie  had 
won,  and  become  the  most  ardent  of  lovers. 
His  betrothed  was  not  blessed  with  very  much 
of  what  the  world  would  call  beauty — "a  little, 
thick,  black-haired  girl,  sturdy,  and  all  I  want, ' ' 
was  his  description  of  her.  Yet  she  had  a  true 
beauty  that  he  was  not  slow  to  appreciate.  "I 
see  no  face  now  to  be  compared  with  that  sun- 
burnt one  which  has  so  often  greeted  me  with  its 
kind  looks,"  he  wrote  her  long  after. 

Their  courtship  was  short,  but  exceedingly 
happy.  Livingstone  was  fond  of  his  jokes,  and 
Mary  Moffat  knew  how  to  take  them.  Notwith- 
standing their  deep  piety  they  were  very  merry 
together,  and  even  in  later  life,  when  David  was 
so  famous,  and  both  were,  to  all  appearances,  so 
decorous  and  sober,  they  continued  to  be  playful 
at  home. 

The  happy  days  at  Kuruman  soon  came  to  an 
end.  Toward  the  close  of  July  Livingstone  re- 
turned to  Mabotsa  to  build  a  house  and  lay  out 
a  garden  in  anticipation  of  the  coming  of  his 
bride. 

At  Motito,  eighteen  miles  up  from  Kuruman, 
he  wrote,  on  August  1,  1844,  the  first  of  his 
many  love-letters  to  her.  In  it  he  talks  much  of 
their  plans  for  the  future,  and  asks  if  her  father 
will  write  to  Colesberg  about  the  license  for  their 
marriage.    *'If  he  cannot  get  it  we  will  license 


Finding  a  Wife  on  the  Field         37 

ourselves,"  he  jokingly  says.  Then  he  closes  as 
follows : 

**And  now,  my  dearest,  farewell.  May  God 
bless  you !  Let  your  affection  be  much  more  to- 
ward Him  than  toward  me;  and,  kept  by  His 
mighty  power  and  grace,  I  hope  I  shall  never  give 
you  cause  to  regret  that  you  have  given  me  a 
part.  Whatever  friendship  we  feel  toward  each 
other,  let  us  always  look  to  Jesus  as  our  common 
Friend  and  Guide,  and  may  He  shield  you  with 
His  everlasting  arms  from  every  evil!'* 

At  Mabotsa,  though  his  arm  still  gave  him 
much  trouble,  he  began  at  once  on  the  house. 
He  had  almost  no  help,  and  it  proved  a  slow 
and  laborious  task.  But  love  spurred  him  on. 
In  a  letter  giving  an  account  of  his  progress,  he 
wrote:  ''It  is  pretty  hard  work,  and  almost 
enough  to  drive  love  out  of  my  head,  but  it  is 
not  situated  there ;  it  is  in  my  heart,  and  won 't 
come  out  unless  you  behave  so  as  to  quench  it ! " 

Mary  Moffat  treasured  the  letters  he  wrote 
during  their  courtship  as  long  as  she  lived. 
Years  after,  when  they  were  far  apart  and  feel- 
ing the  separation  most  keenly,  he  wrote  her  as 
follows :  * '  You  may  read  the  letters  over  again 
that  I  wrote  at  Mabotsa,  the  sweet  time  you 
know.  As  I  told  you  before,  I  tell  you  again, 
they  are  true,  true;  there  is  not  a  bit  of  hypo- 
crisy in  them.     I  never  show  all  my  feelings; 


38   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

but  I  can  say  truly,  my  dearest,  that  I  loved 
you  when  I  married  you,  and  the  longer  I  lived 
with  you,  I  loved  you  the  better.'^ 

Before  the  year  closed  the  wedding  took  place, 
and  she  who  bore  the  honored  name  of  Moffat 
exchanged  it  for  one,  little  known  at  the  time, 
but  soon  to  be  famous  throughout  the  whole 
earth. 

It  was  a  joyous  and  happy  occasion,  with  few 
tears  and  no  anguish  at  parting.  The  Living- 
stones, back  in  the  old  home  in  Scotland,  re- 
joiced that  their  son  had  foimd  such  a  wife,  and 
the  Moffats  thanked  God  that  their  first-born  was 
marrying  such  a  promising  young  pioneer. 
They  would  miss  the  dear  daughter,  in  both  the 
home  and  the  mission,  but  she  was  not  going  very 
far  from  them  and  would  still  be  in  the  same 
work  as  they. 

The  young  couple  proceeded  at  once  to 
Mabosta.  Strange  to  say,  the  name  means 
' '  marriage-feast. ' '  The  house  was  ready  and  the 
garden  in  beautiful  order,  and  Mary  Living- 
stone took  up  her  new  tasks  with  great  ardor. 

To  her  husband  it  was  all  joy,  having  her  with 
him.  **I  often  think  of  you,"  he  wrote  to  his 
mother,  **and  perhaps  more  frequently  since  I 
got  married  than  before.  Only  yesterday  I  said 
to  my  wife,  when  I  thought  of  the  nice  clean 
bed  I  enjoy  now,  'You  put  me  in  mind  of  my 


DAVID     LIVINGSTON     AND     HIS     DAUGHTER     AGNES 


Finding  a  Wife  on  the  Field         39 

mother;  she  was  always  particular  about  our 
beds  and  our  linen.'  I  had  had  rough  times 
before.'* 

Livingstone's  marriage,  connecting  him  with 
the  Moffats,  was  one  of  the  great  providential 
things  in  his  life.  **No  family  on  the  face  of 
the  globe  could  have  been  so  helpful  to  him  in 
his  great  work,"  says  Dr.  Blaikie. 

And  no  wife  could  have  done  more  than  his 
own  Mary  Moffat.  "When  God  called  him  to 
open  up  Africa,  after  their  marriage,  she  could 
not  make  the  long  journeys  with  him  on  account 
of  their  children.  She  tried  it  at  first  and 
proved  a  great  traveler.  **Your  mamma  was 
famous  for  roughing  it  in  the  bush,  and  was 
never  a  trouble,"  Livingstone  wrote  to  their 
daughter,  after  the  death  of  her  mother. 

But  the  children  suffered  so  much  that  at  last 
she  consented  to  take  them  to  England  and  let 
her  dear  David  plunge  into  the  forest  alone.  It 
was  hard,  yet  she  had  no  thought  of  holding 
him  back.  The  iaterests  of  the  great  continent 
was  as  dear  to  her  as  to  him,  and  she  endured, 
for  years  at  a  time,  suffering  and  suspense  and 
separation  that  he  might  be  free  for  the  work. 

Opening  up  Africa  cost  them  both  sore,  but 
many  shall  rise  up  and  call  them  blessed  be- 
cause of  it. 


IV 

A  COURTSHIP  BY  CORRESPONDENCE 

JAMES  GILMOUR'S  courtship  was  as  out- 
of-the-ordinary  as  everything  else  about 
him.  Yet,  like  all  that  he  did,  it  bore  the 
stamp  of  complete  consecration  to  God. 

"When  he  sailed  for  China  in  1870,  a  strong, 
manly  young  fellow  of  twenty-seven,  he  went 
without  either  a  wife  or  a  colleague.  Yet  it  was 
a  lonely  task  that  awaited  him — ^the  reopening 
of  the  London  Missionary  Society's  long  sus- 
pended work  in  Mongolia — and  at  times  he  was 
almost  overwhelmed  at  the  prospect. 

*' Companions  I  can  scarcely  hope  to  meet," 
he  wrote  before  sailing,  *'and  the  feeling  of  be- 
ing alone  comes  over  me  till  I  think  of  Christ 
and  His  blessed  promise,  *Lo,  I  am  with  you 
alway,  even  unto  the  end  of  the  world. '  No  one 
who  does  not  go  away,  leaving  all  and  being 
alone,  can  feel  the  force  of  this  promise.  When 
I  begin  to  feel  my  heart  threatening  to  go  down, 
I  betake  myself  to  this  companionship,  and, 
thank  God,  I  have  felt  the  blessedness  of  this 
promise  rushing  over  me  repeatedly  when  I  knelt 
down  and  spoke  to  Jesus  as  a  present  compan- 
40 


A  Courtship  by  Correspondence      41 

ion,  from  whom  I  am  sure  to  find  sympathy.  I 
have  felt  a  tingle  of  delight  thrilling  over  me 
as  I  felt  His  presence,  and  thought  that  wher- 
ever I  may  go  He  is  still  with  me/' 

On  the  barren  plains  of  Mongolia,  the  loneli- 
ness proved  ever  greater  than  he  had  antici- 
pated. Christ  was  indeed  an  ever-present  friend, 
but  young  Gilmour,  though  so  intensely  in  earn- 
est, was  merry  and  full  of  fun,  and  craved 
human  companionship.  In  August,  1870,  when 
he  began  his  first  great  journey  among  the  Mon- 
gols, a  strong  feeling  of  aversion  came  over  him 
to  traveling  alone  in  a  region  entirely  unknown 
to  him.  An  unexpected  companion,  in  the  per- 
son of  a  Russian  merchant,  relieved  this  some- 
what, but  at  Kiachta,  the  southern  frontier  of 
Siberia,  the  loneliness  became  well-nigh  unbear- 
able. 

**  To-day  I  felt  a  good  deal  like  Elijah  in  the 
wilderness,"  he  wrote  in  his  diary  during  a  brief 
period  of  enforced  inactivity.  *  *  He  prayed  that 
he  might  die.  I  wonder  if  I  am  telling  the 
truth  when  I  say  that  I  felt  drawn  towards  sui- 
cide. I  take  this  opportunity  of  declaring 
strongly  that  on  all  occasions  two  missionaries 
should  go  together.  I  was  not  of  this  opinion  a 
few  weeks  ago,  but  I  had  no  idea  how  weak  an 
individual  I  am.  My  eyes  have  filled  with  tears 
frequently  these  last  few  days  in  spite  of  myself. 


42   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

Oh!  the  intense  loneliness  of  Christ's  life,  not 
a  single  one  understood  Him!  He  bore  it.  O 
Jesus,  let  me  follow  in  thy  steps ! ' ' 

At  Peking,  his  headquarters  between  trips,  he 
had  no  home  of  his  own,  but  lived  in  rented 
rooms  with  a  native  Chinese  servant.  His  meals 
he  took  with  a  fellow-missionary,  Mr.  Edkins. 
Going  to  his  home  broke  the  monotony  and 
helped  not  a  little;  nevertheless  he  was  lonely 
and  his  life  sorely  lacking  in  comfort. 

His  two  great  needs  were  a  wife  and  a  col- 
league. The  colleague  he  asked  the  Directors  in 
London  to  send  him.  The  wife  he  attempted  to 
find  for  himself.  A  true  son  of  Scotia,  he  pro- 
posed first  to  a  Scotch  girl — ^whether  in  person 
before  he  left  home,  or  by  letter  from  China,  he 
has  not  divulged.  But  the  Scotch  girl  said 
* '  No. ' '  He  had  asked  her  too  late.  She  was  al- 
ready pledged  to  another. 

His  own  efforts  to  fiaid  a  wife  being  thus 
thwarted,  Gilmour  turned  to  the  Lord.  ' '  I  then 
put  myself,  he  says,  *'and  the  direction  of  this 
affair — I  mean  the  finding  of  a  wife — into  God's 
hands,  asking  Him  to  look  me  out  one,  a  good 
one,  too." 

And  God  did  what  he  asked.  In  May,  1873, 
when  Mr.  Edkins  returned  to  England,  Gilmour 
lost  his  boarding-place.  But  he  soon  found  an- 
other.   Mr.  Meech,  an  old  college  chum  who  had 


'A  Courtship  by  Correspondence      43 

recently  come  to  Peking  with  his  bride,  took 
bim  in. 

In  the  old  home  in  England,  Mrs.  Meech  (nee 
Miss  Prankard,  of  London)  bad  a  young  sister, 
Emily,  who  was  inexpressibly  dear  to  her.  Com- 
ing in  to  bis  meals,  Gilmour  saw  her  picture, 
read  extracts  from  her  letters,  and  heard  her 
praises  sounded  continuously.  By  and  by  he 
found  himself  so  greatly  attracted  to  the  absent 
young  lady  that  he  wondered  what  it  all  meant. 
Could  she  be  the  bride  God  was  going  to  give 
him? 

Toward  the  close  of  the  year,  he  told  Mrs. 
Meech  all  about  it  and  asked  if  he  might  cor- 
respond with  her  sister.  She  was  delighted  and 
gladly  gave  her  consent.  The  prospect  of  hav- 
ing Emily  with  her  in  China  filled  her  with  joy, 
and  she  and  her  husband  had  already  learned 
to  love  and  trust  Gilmour. 

GUmour  was  not  slow  to  make  use  of  the  per- 
mission Mrs.  Meech  gave  him.  Early  in  Janu- 
ary, 1874,  he  wrote  to  Miss  Prankard,  opening 
up  a  correspondence  with  her.  Gilmour-like,  the 
very  first  letter  contained  a  proposal  of  mar- 
riage ! 

By  the  same  mail  he  wrote  to  his  parents  in 
Scotland.  '*I  have  written  and  proposed  to  a 
girl  in  England, '*  he  said.  *'It  is  true  I  have 
never  seen  her,  and  I  know  very  little  about  her ; 


44    Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

but  what  I  do  know  is  good.  Her  mother  sup- 
ports herself  and  daughter  by  keeping  a  school. 
One  of  the  hiadrances  will  be  perhaps  that  the 
mother  will  not  be  willing  to  part  with  her 
daughter,  as  she  is,  no  doubt,  the  life  of  the 
school.  I  don't  know,  so  I  have  written  and 
made  the  offer,  and  leave  them  to  decide.  If 
she  cannot  come,  then  there  is  no  harm  done. 
If  she  can  arrange  to  come,  then  my  hope  is 
fulfilled.  If  the  young  lady  says  *Yes,'  she  or 
her  friends  will  no  doubt  write  you,  as  I  have 
asked  them  to  do.  You  may  think  I  am  rash 
in  writing  to  a  girl  I  have  never  seen.  If  you 
say  so,  I  may  just  say  that  I  have  somethiQg  of 
th-e  same  feeling;  but  what  am  I  to  do?  In 
addition  I  am  very  easy  minded  over  it  all,  be- 
cause I  have  exercised  the  best  of  my  thoughts 
on  the  subject,  and  put  the  whole  matter  into 
the  hands  of  God,  asking  Him,  if  it  be  best,  to 
bring  her,  if  it  be  not  best,  to  keep  her  away, 
and  He  can  manage  the  whole  thing  well." 

Having  posted  these  letters,  Gilmour  started 
on  a  long  tour  through  Mongolia,  and  tried  to 
forget  all  about  it. 

"When  Emily  Prankard  received  his  l-etter  in 
London,  she  at  once  took  the  matter  to  God.  She 
had  never  seen  this  would-be  husband,  but  she 
had  heard  much  about  him  from  her  sister  in 
China  and  friends  of  his  in  the  homeland.    The 


A  Courtship  by  Correspondence      45 

spirit  of  missions  was  strong  in  her  heart,  and 
at  length  she  wrote  him  that  she  would  come  to 
China  and  join  him  in  his  work  for  Mongolia. 

Receiving  one  another  on  trust  from  the  Lord, 
neither  of  the  young  people  took  long  to  decide. 
"The  first  letter  I  wrote  her  was  to  propose, '^ 
says  Gilmour,  **and  the  first  letter  she  wrote 
me  was  to  accept — romantic  enough!" 

Owing  to  a  delay  in  the  mails,  the  announce- 
ment did  not  come  to  the  old  folks  in  Scotland 
through  their  son 's  letter  as  he  had  planned,  but 
in  a  note  from  Miss  Prankard  's  mother  in  Lon- 
don. ''My  parents  were  scared  one  day  last 
year,'*  Gilmour  wrote  after  his  marriage,  **by 
receiving  a  letter  from  a  lady  in  England,  a 
lady  whose  name  even  they  had  not  known  be- 
fore, stating  that  her  daughter  had  decided  to 
become  my  wife!  Didn't  it  stir  up  the  old  peo- 
ple !  My  letter  to  them,  posted  at  the  same  time, 
had  been  delayed  in  London." 

It  was  a  shock  at  first,  but  Gilmour 's  parents 
soon  became  reconciled  to  his  engagement.  Be- 
fore sailing  for  China,  Emily  Prankard  spent 
two  weeks  with  them  in  Scotland,  and  so  com- 
pletely won  their  hearts  that  they  wrote  to  their 
son  that  ''though  he  had  searched  the  country 
for  a  couple  of  years  he  could  not  have  made  a 
better  choice." 

Meanwhile  Gilmour  himself  was  quietly  pur- 


46   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

suing  his  work  on  the  plans  of  Mongolia.  On 
the  way  back  in  July,  he  thought  much  about 
the  question  he  had  asked  six  months  before. 
Would  there  he  an  answer  waiting  for  him  ?  If 
so,  what  would  it  be?  At  Kalgan  he  found  a 
package  of  letters.  One  bore  the  London  post- 
mark and  the  hand-writing  he  had  grown  famil- 
iar with  on  Mrs.  Meech's  letters.  It  was  from 
Emily  Prankard,  and  her  answer  was,  *'Yes!" 

*^I  proposed  in  January,''  he  says,  ''went  up 
to  Mongolia  in  the  spring,  rode  about  on  my 
camels  till  July,  and  came  down  to  Kalgan  to 
find  that  I  was  an  accepted  man!" 

A  short,  but  happy  courtship  by  corres- 
pondence followed.  *'You  will  be  glad  to  hear 
that  I  have  had  some  delightful  letters  from 
Miss  Prankard,"  he  wrote  to  his  mother  in 
Scotland.  **She  has  written  me  in  the  most 
unrestrained  way  concerning  her  spiritual  hopes 
and  condition,  and  though  we  have  never  seen 
each  other,  yet  we  know  more  of  each  other's 
inmost  life  and  soul  than,  I  am  quite  certain, 
most  lovers  know  of  each  other  even  after  long 
personal  courtship.  It  is  quite  delightful  to 
think  that  even  now  we  can  talk  by  letter  with 
perfect  unreserve,  and  I  tell  you  this  because  I 
know  you  will  be  glad  to  hear  of  it.  I  knew 
she  was  a  pious  girl,  else  I  would  not  have  asked 
her  to  come  out  to  be  a  missionary's  wife,  but 


A  Courtship  by  Correspondence      47 

she  turns  out  better  even  than  I  thought,  and  I 
am  not  much  afraid  as  to  how  we  shall  get  on 
together.'' 

Early  in  the  autumn,  Emily  Prankard  sailed 
for  China,  and  in  November,  Gilmour  and  Mr. 
Meech  went  to  Tien-tsin  to  meet  her.  For  two 
weeks  nothing  was  heard  of  the  steamer,  but  at 
length,  on  Sabbath  evening,  November  29,  word 
came  that  she  was  outside  the  bar,  waiting  for 
the  tide  to  bring  her  up  to  the  city.  Next  morn- 
ing, at  five  o'clock,  Gilmour  and  Meech  boarded 
a  steam  launch  and  started  down  the  river. 
About  eight  o'clock  they  met  the  steamer  com- 
ing up,  and  Mr.  Meech  recognized  Miss  Prank- 
ard on  deck.  But  the  steamer  did  not  stop,  and 
poor  Gilmour  had  to  wait  another  three  hours! 

Emily  Prankard 's  first  view  of  her  lover  must 
have  been  something  of  a  shock.  *  *  The  morning 
was  cold,"  says  Mr.  Meech,  *^and  Gilmour  was 
clad  in  an  old  overcoat  which  had  seen  much 
service  in  Siberia  and  had  a  woolen  comforter 
round  his  neck,  having  more  regard  to  warmth 
than  appearance.  "We  had  to  follow  back  to 
Tien-tsin,  Gilmour  being  thought  by  those  on 
board  the  steamer  to  be  the  engineer!" 

But  there  was  a  charm  about  Gilmour  that  was 
irresistible,  and,  nothwithstanding  his  unbecom- 
ing attire,  Emily  Prankard  soon  found  him  all 
she  had  hoped  for.    No  one  ever  came  within  the 


48   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

sphere  of  his  influence  without  learning  to  love 
him,  and,  divested  of  old  coat  and  woolen  com- 
forter, he  was  a  fine  looking  young  fellow  whom 
any  girl  might  be  proud  to  own  as  her  lover. 
*' There  was  an  aspect  of  good  humor  about  his 
face  and  a  glance  of  his  eye  revealing  any 
amount  of  fun  and  frolic,"  says  one  of  his  fel- 
low-students. **  Honesty,  good  nature,  and  true 
manliness  were  so  stamped  upon  every  feature 
and  line  of  it,  that  you  had  only  to  see  him  to 
feel  that  he  was  one  of  God's  noblest  works, 
and  to  be  drawn  to  him  as  by  a  magnetic  in- 
fluence." 

On  Tuesday,  December  1,  Miss  Prankard  left 
for  Peking,  with  Meech  and  Gilmour  as  escorts. 
On  Thursday  she  reached  the  home  of  her  sister, 
and  on  the  following  Tuesday  the  wedding  took 
place.  **I  think  I  must  have  said  *I  wiir  ia  a 
feeble  voice, ' '  says  Gilmour,  '  *  for  my  wife  when 
her  turn  came  sung  out  *I  will'  in  a  voice  that 
startled  herself  and  me,  and  made  it  omnious 
how  much  will  she  was  going  to  have  in  the 
matter!" 

In  a  letter  to  his  friend,  Mr.  Lovett,  the  bride- 
groom annoimced  the  wedding  in  true  Gilmour- 
fashion  as  follows: 

**I  was  married  last  week,  Tuesday,  Decem- 
ber 8! 

''Mrs.  Meech 's  sister  is  now  Mrs.   Gilmour. 


'A  Courtship  by  Correspondence      49 

"We  never  saw  each  other  until  a  week  before  we 
were  married,  and  my  friends  here  drew  long 
faces  and  howled  at  me  for  being  rash.  What 
if  you  don't  like  each  other?  How  then?  It 
is  for  life!  As  if  I  didn't  know  all  this  long 
ago!" 

After  a  honeymoon  of  one  week,  Gilmour 
started  out  with  Mr.  Meech  on  a  nine-days'  tour 
iQto  the  country.  Two  days  before  Christmas 
he  returned  and  settled  down  in  Peking  for  a 
whUe  to  get  acquainted  with  his  wife. 

She  proved  all  he  hoped  for  and  more.  To 
a  Scotch  friend,  whose  letter,  warning  him  not 
to  take  an  English  girl  for  a  wife,  came  after  his 
marriage,  he  wrote,  ** About  my  wife:  as  I  want 
you  to  know  her,  I  introduce  you  to  her.  She 
is  a  jolly  girl,  as  much,  perhaps  more,  of  a 
Christian  and  a  Christian  missionary  than  I  am. 
....  The  whole  thing  was  gone  about  on  the 
faith  principle,  and  from  its  success,  I  am  in- 
clined to  think  more  and  more  highly  of  the 
plan.  Without  any  gammon,  I  am  much  happier 
than  even  in  my  day  dreams  I  ever  imagined  I 
might  be.  It  is  not  only  me  that  my  wife  pleases, 
but  she  has  gained  golden  opinions  from  most  of 
the  people  who  have  met  her  among  my  friends 
and  acquaintances  in  Scotland  and  China.  You 
need  not  be  the  least  bit  shy  of  me  or  my  Eng- 
lish wife.     She  is  a  good  lassie,  any  quantity 


50   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

better  than  me,  and  just  as  handy  as  a  Scotch 
lass  would  have  been.  It  was  great  fun  for  her 
to  read  your  tirade  about  English  wives  and 
your  warning  about  her.  She  is  a  jolly  kind  of 
body,  and  does  not  take  offense,  but  I  guess  if 
she  comes  across  you,  she  will  shake  you  up  a 
bit!'' 

Unusual  as  their  courtship  had  been,  their 
marriage  proved  one  of  the  happiest  on  record. 
In  the  bride  God  gave  him,  Gilmour  found  not 
only  a  wife,  but  a  colleague — the  only  one  he 
was  ever  permitted  to  have.  Hand  in  hand  they 
worked  for  the  Mongols,  her  zeal  fully  equal  to 
his.  Delicately  nurtured  though  she  had  been, 
this  refined  English  lady  accompanied  her  hus- 
band on  many  a  long,  hard  journey  through 
Mongolia,  not  only  to  relieve  his  loneliness,  but 
to  do  her  share  in  wianing  the  Mongols  to  Christ. 

For  eleven  years  she  endured  privations  and 
faced  dangers  of  no  common  sort  with  a  heroism 
that  has  rarely  been  equalled.  Then  God  took 
her  home,  and  GUmour  was  left  with  his  mother- 
less lads.  But  she  had  been  a  great  help  to  him, 
and  their  union  the  one  great  joy  of  his  twenty 
years'  lonely  and  difficult  toil. 


THE  CALL  OF  GOD  IN  AN  OFFER  OF 
MARRIAGE 

WHEN  Francois  Coillard  reached  Leribe, 
Africa,  in  1859,  clean-shaven  and  un- 
married, the  Basutos  were  greatly  per- 
plexed. Could  this  beardless,  wifeless  youth  be 
the  missionary  they  were  expecting?  He  was 
nothing  but  a  boy ! 

*'What  could  he  teach  T'  asked  the  women 
drawing  water  from  a  little  well  at  the  close  of 
his  first  day  among  them.  *  *  He  is  a  young  man ; 
he  has  neither  a  wife  nor  a  beard." 

But  his  case  was  not  hopeless.  There  were 
remedies  for  defects  such  as  these.  Coillard  heard 
what  was  said,  and  in  a  very  short  time  had 
grown  a  beard  which  raised  him  immeasurably 
in  the  eyes  of  the  natives.  He  thus  quickly 
and  easily  acquired  one  of  the  marks  of  a  man 
among  the  Basutos.  Would  he  ever  acquire  the 
other?  This  was  a  question  the  young  French- 
man was  ever  asking  himself. 

Coillard  was  not  without  a  wife  because  he 
did  not  want  one.    "When  the  Paris  Missionary 
Society  assigned  him  to  a  lonely  pioneer  post, 
51 


52   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

he  knew  he  would  need  a  woman  *s  care  and  com- 
panionship. But  his  reverence  for  womanhood 
was  so  great  that  his  ideas  of  matrimony  were 
BO  high  and  exalted  that  he  was  unwilling  to 
marry  merely  for  the  sake  of  comfort  and  com- 
panionship. He  wanted  a ' '  wife  from  the  Lord '  * 
and  was  willing  to  wait  until  the  Lord  sent  her. 

One  evening,  not  long  before  he  sailed  in 
1857,  he  thought  he  had  found  her.  He  had 
gone,  as  he  frequently  did,  to  the  home  of  the 
rich  and  pious  Madame  Andre-Walther,  then  the 
rendezvous  of  all  Protestants  of  note  in  Paris. 
In  her  brilliantly  lighted  salon,  crowded  with 
students  and  professors,  deaconesses  and  court 
ladies,  he  was  presented  to  a  newcomer  among 
them.  Miss  Christina  Mackintosh  by  name,  who 
had  come  over  from  Scotland  to  assist  her  sister, 
Miss  Kate,  who  had  been  teaching  for  two  years 
in  Paris. 

From  the  moment  they  met  Coillard  knew 
that  Christiaa  Mackintosh  was  the  wife  that  he 
wanted.  But  he  said  nothing  to  her.  There  was 
no  time  for  their  acquaintance  to  ripen  into 
even  an  ordinary  friendship,  and  he  feared  to 
act  on  such  a  sudden  impulse  lest  it  be  a  mere 
human  desire,  and  not  ''of  the  Lord.''  So  he 
sailed  away  without  revealing  the  hope  in  his 
heart  that  some  day  she  would  come  to  Africa 
and  share  his  work  for  the  Basutos. 


Call  of  God  in  an  Offer  of  Marriage    53 

The  foundations  of  his  hope  were  very  slight. 
Th-ere  was  no  ground  for  it  whatever  save  that 
he  knew  her  heart  was  in  the  mission  field. 
"When  little  more  than  a  child,  she  had  resolved 
to  be  a  missionary  to  Africa.  But  this  purpose 
had  lain  dormant  until  an  address  of  his  own, 
which  she  had  heard  soon  after  coming  to  Paris, 
revived  it  again. 

Nevertheless  the  vision  went  with  him. 
Throughout  the  long  journey  by  sea  and  by  land 
the  conviction  steadily  grew  that  she  was  The 
One.  At  length,  in  obedience  to  what  he  be- 
lieved to  be  diviae  guidance,  he  wrote  from  Af- 
rica, offeriQg  her  his  heart  and  his  hand.  In  the 
orthodox  fashion  of  France,  the  proposal  was 
made  through  their  mutual  friend,  Madame 
Walther. 

Six  months  passed  and  then  came  her  answer 
— a  refusal  on  the  ground  that  she  did  not  know 
him  well  enough!  This  was  true.  Yet  had  it 
not  been  for  the  storm  of  opposition  it  raised, 
her  answer  might  have  been  different.  She  had 
heard  God  calling  her  to  Africa,  and  she  had 
seen  enough  of  Coillard  to  know  that  he  was 
one  of  the  noblest  and  most  lovable  of  men. 

Her  sister  Kate  alone  favored  her  going.  She 
had  known  Coillard  in  Paris,  and  felt  that  it 
was  an  honor  for  her  sister  to  be  asked  to  share 
the  life  of  this  heroic  young  missionary.     But 


54   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

every  one  else  was  opposed  to  it.  Her  mother 
refused  to  entertain  the  idea,  and  Coillard's 
friends,  as  well  as  her  own,  expressed  their  dis- 
approval very  frankly.  She  was  implored  not 
to  bury  her  talents  lq  Africa,  and  he  was  warned 
that  a  young  woman  who  was  more  at  home  in 
the  class-room  than  the  kitchen  would  be  a 
hindrance  instead  of  a  help.  So  Christina, 
strong  and  self-reliant  though  she  was,  yielded 
to  the  opposition  and  stayed  at  home.  But 
from  now  on  she  devoted  every  spare  moment 
to  work  among  the  poor — to  quiet  her  conscience, 
perhaps. 

It  was  a  sore  disappoiatment  to  Coillard,  and 
a  great  test  of  his  faith.  He  had  been  so  sure 
she  would  come.  But  it  was  all  a  part  of  God's 
plan.  At  this  time  Coillard  was  somewhat  lack- 
iQg  in  self-confidence,  and  much  too  dependent 
on  human  sympathy  and  help.  But  now,  alone 
with  the  heathen,  he  l-earned  to  find  God  all  in 
all.  It  was  a  sore  experience,  but  it  gave  him 
new  beauty  and  strength. 

But  it  was  hard.  Entries  in  his  diary  and 
letters  to  his  mother  show  how  intensely  he  suf- 
fered from  isolation  among  a  people  entirely 
heathen.  The  loneliness  was  almost  unbearable, 
and  added  to  it  were  the  burdens  of  housekeep- 
ing, with  no  help  save  from  careless  and  in- 


1-1  c 


c;s 


W  o 


II 


P<U 


Call  of  God  in  an  Offer  of  Marriage    55 

competent  natives,  who  spoiled  his  food  and 
smashed  his  dishes. 

For  two  years  Coillard  worked  on  alone,  one  of 
the  world's  real  heroes.  He  put  away  all 
thought  of  marriage,  yet  ever  and  anon  there 
came  to  him  the  vision  of  a  face  with  sparkling 
eyes — ^not  beautiful,  perhaps,  but  calm  and  rest- 
ful and  full  of  resolute  purpose.  He  could  not 
banish  it,  do  what  he  would,  and  it  filled  him 
with  longiQg.  It  was  the  face  of  Christuia,  the 
girl  who  would  not  come. 

Did  she  ever  think  of  him,  alone  in  Africa, 
and  suffering  so?  Had  she  ever  regretted  the 
answer  she  gave?  Would  it  be  any  use  to  ask 
her  again  ?  He  ne-eded  her  so  much,  and  so  did 
the  work!  What  could  he  not  do  with  her  to 
help  him!  At  length,  haviug  sought  counsel  of 
God,  he  wrote  agaia,  and  this  time  the  answer 
was  different. 

Christina  now  perceived  that  it  was  God  who 
was  calling  her — that  this  twice-repeated  offer 
of  marriage  was  her  opportunity  for  fulfilling 
her  early  vow  to  be  a  missionary.  Viewed  in 
this  light,  she  dared  not  decline  it.  So  she 
wrote  she  would  come. 

There  was  opposition  still,  but  not  from  those 
nearest  and  dearest.  God  had  been  working  in 
her  mother's  heart,  and  she  was  now  able  to 
make  the  sacrifice  with  joy.    *'I  would  rather 


56   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

see  my  daughter  a  missionary  than  a  princess/* 
she  wrote  to  her  soon-to-be  son-in-law. 

Coillard's  cup  overflowed  when  he  received 
Christina 's  acceptance.  '  *  I  cannot  believe  in  my 
own  happiness,"  he  wrote  in  his  diary  on  July 
5,  1860,  the  day  her  answer  arrived.  It  had  a 
good  effect,  too,  on  his  work.  ''Molapo,  now  he 
knows  I  am  going  to  be  married,  acquaints  me 
with  all  his  affairs,  and  demands  my  advice," 
he  wrote  of  the  chief  a  month  later. 

Knowing  how  much  she  was  needed,  Christina 
resolved  to  sail  for  Africa  before  the  end  of  the 
year.  On  July  5,  the  very  day  her  letter  reached 
Leribe,  she  left  Paris  and  started  for  Scotland 
to  prepare  for  the  wedding.  ''It  was  a  terrible 
wrench  to  leave  everything  dear  to  her,"  says 
h-er  niece.  ''She  had  no  illusions  as  to  what 
kind  of  a  life  awaited  her,  and  it  was  not  the 
kind  she  liked.  She  preferred  civilization  to 
the  wilds." 

Coillard  knew  something  of  what  it  was  cost- 
ing and  was  full  of  tenderest  sympathy  for  her. 
"I  do  not  know  that  I  could  do  what  you  are 
doing,"  he  wrote  her,  "giving  up  all  for  an  un- 
known country  and  an  almost  unknown  hus- 
band." 

The  knowledge  that  it  was  God's  will  alone 
sustained  her.  This  also  Coillard  knew  and  ap- 
preciated.   "How  happy  I  am,"  he  wrote  later, 


Call  of  God  in  an  Offer  of  Marriage    57 

* '  to  see  that  you  perceive  clearly  the  will  of  God 
ia  our  union.  Later  on  that  will  be  a  source  of 
strength  and  comfort.  For  ia  the  days  of  dis- 
appointment and  trial,  when  Satan  will  whisper, 
'What  are  you  doiQg  here?'  you  will  be  able 
to  answer,  'God,  my  God,  bade  me  go,  and  I 
have  obeyed.'  May  I,  by  my  constant  love,  fill 
all  the  empty  places  in  your  heart." 

Of  her  letters  to  him  at  this  time  only  one  has 
survived.  One  passage  in  it  shows  how  eagerly 
she  welcomed  anything  that  added  to  the  tie 
between  them.  "What  do  you  say,  dear  Frank, 
to  this  letter  all  ia  English  f  she  wrote.  "It 
would  have  been  sad  for  me  to  write  you  in  a 
foreign  language  from  home,  for  I  cling  so  to 
your  haviQg  this  at  least  in  common  to  those 
dear  to  me,  that  you  understand  their  tongue  as 
well  as  your  own." 

In  the  autumn  Christina  went  to  Asnieres  in 
France  to  make  the  acquaintance  of  Coillard's 
mother,  to  whom  he  was  devotedly  attached. 
During  this  visit,  which  ever  remained  a  pre- 
cious memory  to  both,  Madame  Coillard  gave  her 
a  packet  of  Francois'  letters  to  read — letters 
which  revealed  the  depths  of  love  and  tenderness 
in  his  nature,  and  showed  how  much  he  had  suf- 
fered without  her  ia  Africa.  These,  more  than 
anything  else,  braced  her  for  the  coming  ordeal 
of  breaking  home  ties.     "What  gave  you  such 


58   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

a  happy  thought  T'  Coillard  wrote  to  his 
mother.  **Not  that  my  letters  are  worth  much, 
but  because  they  could  cheer  my  betrothed  amid 
all  the  sorrows  of  parting,  by  assuring  her  that 
an  affectionate  son  would  not  be  on  unloving 
husband. ' ' 

On  November  23,  1860,  Christina  sailed  for 
Africa  on  the  John  Williams.  ''Such  grief  I 
never  saw,  and  can  hardly  bear  to  think  of  now, ' ' 
her  sister  wrote  forty-five  years  after.  But  the 
peace  of  God  soon  filled  her  heart. 

Meanwhile,  in  Africa,  Coillard 's  people  were 
awaiting  her  coming  with  a  joy  scarcely  less 
than  his  own.  ''To-day  you  are  a  man,"  they 
said,  wh-en  he  started  to  the  Cape  to  meet  her. 
"Return  quickly  and  bring  us  our  mother  and 
the  mother  of  our  wives ! ' ' 

Through  a  misunderstanding,  due  to  a  mix-up 
in  the  mails,  Coillard  went  to  Port  Elizabeth, 
whereas  Christina  landed  at  Cape  Town.  With- 
out waiting  for  a  boat  to  take  him  around  by 
the  sea,  he  started  in  hot  haste  across  country. 
There  was  some  little  danger  involved,  but  he 
cared  nothing  for  this.  It  saved  so  much  time ! 
But  when  the  news  of  his  break-neck  journey 
reached  Paris,  the  Director  sent  him  an  official 
rebuke  "for  risking  his  life  to  save  a  few  days' 
time  in  what  was  not  strictly  the  business  of  his 
calling" — a  rebuke  tempered,  however,  by  an 


Call  of  God  in  an  Offer  of  Marriage    59 

unofficial  postscript  saying  that  he  was  **  happy- 
all  the  same  to  have  such  proof  that  chivalry 
was  not  yet  dead  among  the  sons  of  France!" 

Christina's  first  words  to  her  lover  were  the 
heroic  ones  that  formed  the  key-note  of  all  her 
after  life.  ''I  have  come,"  she  said,  **to  do  the 
work  of  God  with  you,  whatever  it  may  be ;  and 
remember  this :  wherever  God  may  call  you,  you 
shall  never  find  me  crossing  your  path  of  duty.'' 

The  weddiQg  took  place  on  February  26,  1861, 
in  the  Union  Church  at  Cape  Town.  Immedi- 
ately after.  Monsieur  and  Madame  Coillard  be- 
gan their  long  wedding  journey  to  their  distant 
field.  It  was  accomplished  ia  the  regulation, 
slow-going,  South  African  ox-wagon,  but  Chris- 
tina, knowing  her  husband's  intense  love  of  the 
beautiful,  had  bent  all  her  energies  toward  mak- 
ing it  pretty  and  homelike.  He  was  delighted, 
and  wrote  to  her  sister,  *  *  Every  one  is  astounded 
in  admiring  the  taste  that  has  decorated  it. 
People  can't  believe  it  is  a  traveling  wagon,  it 
is  so  fresh  and  mignon,  with  its  pretty  curtains, 
its  elegant  pockets  hung  on  either  side,  the 
leopard  skin,  the  plants,  etc.,  the  whole  forming, 
one  would  think,  the  eighth  wonder  of  the 
world." 

Christina  was  very  happy  all  the  way  up 
from  the  Cape.  The  devotion  of  her  husband, 
the  beauty  of  th-e  scenery,  and  the  warm  welcome 


60   Eove  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

of  the  missionaries  through  whose  stations  they 
passed,  made  the  journey  a  joy.  But  after  a  few 
weeks  at  Leribe,  homesickness  and  the  change 
in  climate  combined  to  make  her  ill,  and  she 
grew  listless  and  weary.  During  the  day  she 
bravely  kept  at  her  work,  but  in  the  evenings 
she  sat  pouring  over  old  letters  and  journals  that 
made  the  tears  flow  very  fast.  But  one  day, 
when  alone  in  the  house,  she  suddenly  realized 
that  this  was  all  wrong,  and,  gathering  up  the 
precious  memorials  of  the  past,  she  threw  them 
into  the  fire !  "Wlien  her  husband  returned,  she 
met  him  at  the  door,  saying, ' '  I  have  burnt  them 
all.  You  shall  never  see  me  fretting  again.  For- 
get  thine  own  people  and  thy  father's  house!'' 
* '  Thenceforth  their  life  was  an  unbroken  idyll 
of  thirty  years,"  says  her  niece.  "Of  their 
mutual  happiness  it  seems  almost  sacrilege  to 
write,  yet  something  must  be  said  of  a  union  so 
perfect  begun  in  circumstances  so  unusual. 
Knowing  that  it  was  not  self-will,  but  God's 
Providence,  that  had  brought  them  together, 
each  accepted  the  other  with  absolute  confidence, 
as  a  gift  from  Him,  and  hence  as  one  to  be  cher- 
ished and  held  sacred  for  the  sake  of  the  Giver. 
The  changes  and  trials  of  their  career  only 
served  to  bring  out  fresh  perfections  in  each 
other's  eyes,  so  that  their  whole  married  life 


Call  of  God  in  an  Offer  of  Marriage    61 

was  one  long  series  of  delightful  surprises,  a 
never-ending  romance." 

To  their  sore  disappointment  God  gave  them 
no  children.  But  the  withholding  of  this  served 
only  to  draw  them  closer  together,  and  to  enable 
them  to  give  themselves  wholly  to  Africa. 

For  thirty  years  they  worked  hand  in  hand, 
he  a  hero  and  she  a  heroine  of  no  common 
sort.  When  he  went  on  long  exploring  tours 
into  the  wilderness,  his  wife  went  with  him  do- 
ing her  share  of  the  work  and  supplying  the 
neatness,  the  cleanliness,  and  the  touches  of 
beauty  that  m-eant  so  much  to  one  of  his  high- 
strung,  sensitive  nature. 

In  God's  arithmetic  one  and  one  make  more 
than  two.  *'One  man  shall  chase  a  thousand, 
and  two  shall  put  ten  thousand  to  flight." 
Never  was  this  truer  than  in  the  case  of  the 
Coillards.  Either  alone  would  have  made  a 
great  missionary.  Together  they  accomplished 
a  work  for  Africa  that  was  great  be;;^ond  meas- 
ure. 


VI 

THE  HANDICAP  OF  A  HOPELESS  AT- 
TACHMENT 

TO  MARRY  or  not  to  marry, — ^this  was 
Henry  Martyn's  question, — whether  it 
were  better  to  serve  God  by  remaining 
single  or  by  taking  to  himself  a  wife. 

He  was  only  nineteen,  this  brilliant  young 
student  who  had  found  Christ  at  Cambridge, 
and  was  giving  up  all  to  God.  For  Christ 's  sake 
he  had  already  sacrifictsd  his  chosen  profession, 
the  law,  and  now  came  this  question  of  marriage. 
Back  in  Cornwall,  not  far  from  the  old  home  in 
Truro,  there  was  a  young  lady,  Lydia  Grenfell 
by  name,  whom  he  greatly  admired.  He  hoped 
to  woo  her  some  day  and  make  her  his  wife. 
Must  this  be  added  to  his  other  sacrifices? 

Ere  long  the  question  seemed  answered. 
Charles  Simeon  won  him  for  missions,  and  he 
resolved  to  go  out  under  the  Church  Missionary 
Society  at  his  own  charges.  But  his  income  was 
not  sufficient  for  two.  So  he  put  away  all 
thoughts  of  marriage. 

Yet  the  question  was  far  from  being  settled. 
By  and  by  his  friends  began  to  feel  that  such  a 
62 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attachment    63 

saintly  young  scholar  could  do  more  for  God  as 
a  chaplain  of  the  East  India  Company  than  as  a 
missionary.  It  would  give  him  great  prestige  and 
open  wide  doors  of  opportunity  in  India.  But 
Martyn  shrank  from  its  subtile  temptations.  The 
salary  was  large,  and  a  wife  almost  a  necessity, 
and  he  was  grieved  to  find  dreams  of  marriage 
again  creeping  iuto  his  heart. 

Early  in  1804,  an  event  occurred  which  made 
it  necessary  for  him  to  go  as  a  chaplain  or  not 
at  all.  He  and  his  sisters  lost  all  their  patri- 
mony through  a  disaster  in  Cornwall.  The 
younger,  being  unmarried,  was  left  without 
means  of  support,  and  Martyn  felt  that  he  ought 
to  assume  it.  But  the  salary  of  a  missionary  was 
not  sufficient  for  this.  So,  on  the  advice  of  his 
friends,  he  applied  for  a  chaplaincy.  Being 
promised  the  next  vacant  post,  he  went  down  to 
Cornwall  in  June  to  spend  his  vacation  and  take 
leave  of  his  loved  ones.  Both  parents  were  dead, 
but  his  sisters  were  there,  and  Miss  Grenfell. 

Bitter-sweet  were  the  days  that  he  spent  there. 
Lydia  proved  more  charming  than  ever,  but  mar- 
riage was  out  of  the  question.  Even  a  chap- 
lain's salary,  large  as  it  was,  would  not  support 
both  a  wife  and  a  sister. 

Miss  Grenfell 's  home  at  Marazion  was  only 
twenty-six  miles  from  Truro,  yet  for  over  a  week 
Martyn  made  no  attempt  to  see  her.    On  the  last 


64   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

Sunday  in  June,  when  he  went  to  St.  Hilary 
(not  far  from  Marazion)  to  preach  in  Cornwall's 
famous  old  church,  he  hoped  to  find  her  in  the 
congregation.  But  she  did  not  come  and  he  suf- 
fered the  keenest  disappointment.  Yet,  in  his 
pain,  he  thanked  God  for  keeping  her  away,  as 
she  might  have  proved  a  distraction. 

In  the  evening  after  tea  he  went  to  call  on 
her,  and  that  night  gave  her  large  space  in  that 
famous  journal  in  which  henceforth  her  name 
appears  on  almost  every  page. 

*' Called  after  tea  on  Miss  L.  G.,''  the  poor 
young  fellow  wrote,  *'and  walked  with  her  and 

' ,  conversing  on  spiritual  subjects.    All  the 

rest  of  the  eveniag,  and  at  night,  I  could  not 
keep  her  out  of  my  mind.  I  felt  too  plainly 
that  I  loved  her  passionately.  The  direct  oppo- 
sition of  this  to  my  devotedness  to  God  in  the 
missionary  way  excited  no  small  tumult  in  my 
miud.  I  contiQued  an  hour  and  a  half  in  prayer 
striving  against  this  attachment.  One  while  I 
was  about  to  triumph,  but  in  a  moment  my 
heart  had  wandered  back  to  the  beloved  idol 
again/' 

A  month  later,  when  he  returned  to  Cam- 
bridge, the  farewells  cost  him  sore.  **  Parted 
with  Lydia,  perhaps  forever  in  this  life,  with  a 
Bort  of  uncertain  pain  which  I  knew  would  in- 
crease to  greater  violence  afterward,''  his  jour- 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attachment    65 

nal  says.  And  thus  it  proved.  Yet  cost  what 
it  might,  he  resolved  to  be  true  to  his  missionary 
vow.  That  night,  ere  he  slept,  he  made  a  re- 
dedication  of  himself  to  God.  ** Never,''  says 
Miss  Yonge,  **were  hopes  and  affections  more 
thoroughly  sacrificed." 

Meanwhile  what  about  Lydia?  Did  she  re- 
turn Martyn's  affection?  Apparently  not  at 
this  time.  She  had  known  him  for  years  (her 
Bister  Emma  had  married  his  cousin)  and  she 
admired  him  greatly.  But  she  was  six  years  his 
senior,  and  her  mind  was  too  much  taken  up 
with  a  former  love  affair  to  thuik  much  about 
him.  The  young  man  to  whom  she  had  been 
engaged  proved  unworthy,  and  afterwards  mar- 
ried another ;  yet  she  had  an  idea  that  her  prom- 
ise to  him  was  binding  as  long  as  he  lived. 

Her  sister,  however,  thought  she  cared  more 
for  Martyn  than  she  was  willing  to  show,  and 
told  him  so  when  he  confided  in  her  the  story  of 
his  love  on  the  way  back  to  London.  This  gave 
him  pain  as  well  as  pleasure,  and  added  to  the 
intensity  of  his  affection. 

Nevertheless  he  adhered  to  his  resolution  not 
to  marry.  But  before  leaving  England,  the 
question  came  up  again  for  discussion.  At  a 
meetiQg  of  the  Eclectic  Society  of  which  he  was 
a  member,  one  of  his  friends  told  him  that  he 
**was  acting  like  a  madman  to  go  out  unmar- 


66   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

ried."  All  the  other  ministers  present  ex- 
pressed the  same  views,  and  poor  Martyn  was 
sorely  perplexed.  His  sister  having  been  re- 
cently betrothed  to  a  worthy  young  man,  he  was 
now  free  to  marry.  Was  this  God's  way  of  re- 
vealing His  will? 

' '  When  I  think  of  Brain erd, '  *  he  wrote  at  this 
time,  *^how  he  lived  among  the  Indians,  travel- 
ing freely  from  place  to  place,  can  I  conceive 
that  he  would  have  been  so  useful  had  he  been 
married  ?  Schwartz  was  never  married,  nor  was 
Paul.  On  the  other  hand,  I  have  often  thought 
how  valuable  would  be  the  counsel  and  comfort 
of  a  Christian  brother  in  India.  These  advan- 
tages would  be  obtained  by  marrying.  I  am 
utterly  at  a  loss  to  know  what  is  best.'* 

His  friends  would  not  let  the  matter  drop, 
and  at  length  he  wrote  to  Mr.  Simeon.  While 
awaiting  his  answer  the  Tempter  stood  by.  *'I 
have  not  felt  such  pain  since  I  parted  from 
Lydia  in  Cornwall,"  he  says.  **I  could  not 
help  saying,  *  Go,  Hindoos,  go  on  in  your  misery ; 
let  Satan  still  rule  over  you;  he  who  is  ap- 
pointed to  labor  over  you  is  consulting  his  ease.' 
No,  thought  I,  hell  and  earth  shall  never  keep 
me  back  from  my  work.''  When  Simeon's  let- 
ter came,  it  contained  such  weighty  arguments 
against  his  marrying  that  he  acquiesced  at  once. 

On  July  17,  1805,  the  young  chaplain  sailed 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attachment    67 

from  Portsmouth  on  the  Union,  one  of  a  large 
fleet  bound  for  the  East.  As  he  slowly  sailed 
past  the  coasts  of  Devonshire  and  his  beloved 
Cornwall,  the  thought  of  the  loved  ones  there 
well-nigh  broke  his  heart.  He  thought  he  had 
parted  from  them  forever,  but  he  was  soon  to 
see  them  again.  On  the  19th,  to  his  great  sur- 
prise, the  fleet  anchored  off  Falmouth,  not  far 
from  his  home!  While  awaiting  orders  from 
Nelson  it  remained  there  three  weeks. 

At  first  Martyn  made  no  attempt  to  see  Lydia, 
though  she  was  only  twenty  miles  away.  But 
ere  long  love  conquered,  and,  having  first  asked 
God  to  prevent  it  if  it  be  contrary  to  His  will, 
he  boarded  the  coach  for  Marazion,  and,  with 
much  confusion,  told  her  of  his  love,  and  asked 
if  sh-e  would  come  out  to  him  if  it  seemed  best 
for  him  to  marry  in  India.  But  she  would  not 
commit  herself,  and  he  returned  to  Falmouth 
greatly  depressed. 

On  August  10  he  went  to  pay  her  what  proved 
his  last  visit.  At  five  that  morning  a  signal  had 
sounded  announcing  the  sailing  of  the  fleet.  But 
he  did  not  know  it  untU  about  nine,  when,  as 
he  sat  reading  the  Scriptures  to  Lydia  and  her 
mother,  a  messenger  arrived  saying  that  a  friend 
was  waiting  at  St.  Hilary  with  a  carriage  to 
take  him  to  Falmouth. 

**It  came  upon  me  like  a  thunderbolt, ' '  says 


68   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

the  poor  young  lover.  **Lydia  was  evidently 
painfully  affected  by  it;  she  came  out  with  me 
that  we  might  be  alone  at  taking  leave,  and  I 
then  told  her  that  she  must  not  be  offended  at 
receiviQg  a  letter  from  me  from  India.  In  the 
great  hurry  she  discovered  more  of  her  mind 
than  she  intended ;  she  made  no  objection  what- 
ever to  coming  out.  Thinking  perhaps  I  wished 
to  make  an  engagement  with  her,  she  said  we 
had  better  go  quite  free.    With  this  I  left  her.'' 

By  diat  of  hard  ridiag  Martyn  reached  Fal- 
mouth in  time.  But  he  had  a  narrow  escape. 
The  fleet  was  well  under  weigh,  but  the  Union, 
having  become  entangled  iu  the  chaias,  had  been 
unable  to  clear  the  harbor.  The  captaia  was 
vexed,  but  Martyn  thanked  God,  and  Lydia 
wrote  iQ  her  diary :  *  *  Doth  not  God  care  for  His 
own,  and  order  •everythiag  that  concerns  them  ? 
The  fleet  must  not  sail  tUl  the  man  of  God 
joined  it;   praised  be  the  name  of  the  Lord." 

Lydia 's  sorrow,  though  not  so  keen,  was  now 
akin  to  Martyn 's  own.  It  sometimes  happens 
that  love  begets  love,  and  it  had  evidently  been 
so  IQ  her  case.  *'Much  have  I  to  testify  of  sup- 
porting grace  this  day,''  she  wrote  in  her  diary 
on  August  10,  after  their  final  parting.  "My 
affections  are  engaged  past  recalling,  and  the 
anguish  I  endured  yesterday,  from  an  apprehen- 
sion that  I  had  treated  him  with  coolness,  ex- 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attachment    69 

ceeds  my  power  to  express ;  but  God  saw  it,  and 
kindly  ordered  that  he  should  come  and  do  away 
the  idea  from  my  mind.  It  contributed  like- 
wise to  my  peace,  and  I  hope  to  his,  that  it  is 
clearly  now  understood  between  us  that  he  ia 
free  to  marry  where  he  is  going,  and  I  have  felt 
quite  resigned  to  the  will  of  God  in  this,  and 
shall  often  pray  the  Lord  to  find  him  a  suitabW 
partner.'*    Little  did  she  know  her  own  heart! 

Two  months  after  landing  at  Calcutta,  Mar- 
tyn  received  a  packet  of  letters  from  home. 
There  was  one  from  Lydia  and  one  from  Charles 
Simeon  sounding  her  praises.  Having  recently 
made  her  acquaintance,  he  now  expressed  regret 
that  she  had  not  gone  to  Lidia  with  Martyn. 
Poor  Martyn!  Did  ever  a  man  suffer  more  at 
the  hands  of  his  friends? 

The  next  day  he  told  his  brother  chaplaia, 
David  Brown,  all  about  it.  Mr.  Brown  assured 
him  that  a  wife  would  be  a  great  help  in  the 
work,  and  advised  him  to  send  for  Lydia.  So, 
on  July  30,  1806,  after  many  days  of  delibera- 
tion and  prayer,  he  wrote  her  a  long  and  loving 
letter  asking  if  she  would  come. 

At  Dinapore,  whither  he  wag  sent  in  October, 
he  waited  long  for  an  answer.  The  heat  was 
excessive,  the  work  heavy,  and  his  strength  be- 
ginning to  fail.  Yet  he  labored  incessantly  and 
gave  much  time  to  prayer. 


70   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

He  greatly  needed  a  wife.  He  had  plenty  of 
servants,  but  no  one  to  watch  over  him  and  make 
him  take  care  of  himself.  His  salary  was  ample, 
but  his  great  house  with  its  spacious  rooms  and 
wide  verandas  was  entirely  lacking  in  comforts. 
Mrs.  Sherwood,  who  with  her  husband  was  Mar- 
tyn's  guest  for  two  days,  tells  how  much  she 
suffered  for  want  of  a  pillow.  Her  face  ached 
badly  at  night,  but  she  could  find  nothing  to 
lay  her  head  on  but  ^*a  bolster  stuffed  as  hard 
as  a  pin-cushion!'' 

But  she  found  much  to  admire  in  Martyn  him- 
self. In  her  autobiography  she  gives  a  charm- 
ing picture  of  him  as  she  knew  him  in  his  Indian 
home.  *^He  was  dressed  in  white  and  looked 
very  pale, ' '  she  says, ' '  which,  however,  was  noth- 
ing singular  in  India.  His  hair,  a  light  brown, 
was  raised  from  his  forehead,  which  was  a  re- 
markably fine  one.  His  features  were  not  reg- 
ular, but  the  expression  was  so  luminous,  so  in- 
tellectual, so  affectionate,  so  beaming  with  di- 
vine charity,  that  no  one  could  have  looked  at  his 
features  and  thought  of  their  form.  He  was  as 
remarkable  for  ease  as  for  cheerfulness,  and  had 
a  rich,  deep  voice  and  fine  taste  for  music.  When 
he  relaxed  from  his  labors  in  the  presence  of 
his  friends,  it  was  to  laugh  and  play  like  a 
happy,  innocent  child,  especially  if  there  were 
children  to  laugh  and  play  with  him." 


c-^W>^^«5g^e.-^^^g<?2^^.,^,2j^  c^^  U^>^^^i^£yZAt^  ^:^^^^tayt^. 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attachment    71 

It  was  weary  waiting  for  Lydia.  ''Ever, 
through  the  solitude,  the  suffering,  and  the  toil- 
ing of  the  first  twelve  months  at  Dinapore,'* 
says  Dr.  George  Smith,  "the  thought  of  Lydia 
Grenfell,  the  hope  of  her  union  to  him,  and  her 
help  in  his  agonizing  for  India,,  runs  like  a 
chord  of  sad  music."  Once  he  dreamed  she 
had  come,  but  awoke  with  a  sigh  to  find  it  only 
a  dream.  "Perhaps  aU  my  hope  about  her  is 
but  a  dream!"  he  wrote  the  next  day  in  his 
diary.  "Yet  be  it  so;  whatever  God  shall  ap- 
point must  be  good  for  us  both,  and  I  will  en- 
deavor to  be  tranquil  and  happy,  pursuing  my 
way  through  the  wilderness  with  equal  steadi- 
ness, whether  with  or  without  a  companion." 

At  last,  on  October  24,  1807,  after  more  than 
a  year  of  suspense,  her  answer  reached  Dinapore 
— a  refusal  on  the  ground  that  her  mother  would 
not  give  her  consent. 

It  was  a  blow  that  well-nigh  crushed  Martyn. 
"Lydia  refuses  to  come  because  her  mother  will 
not  give  her  consent,"  he  wrote  to  the  Rev. 
David  Brown,  who  had  advised  him  to  send  for 
her.  "Sir,  you  must  not  wonder  at  my  pale 
looks  when  I  receive  so  many  hard  blows  on  my 
heart.  Yet  a  Father's  love  appoints  the  trial,  and 
I  pray  that  it  may  have  its  intended  effect.  Yet, 
if  you  wish  to  prolong  my  existence  in  this  world, 
make  a  representation  to  some  persons  at  home 


72   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

who  may  influence  her  friends.  Your  word  will 
be  believed  sooner  than  mine.  The  extraordi- 
nary effect  of  mental  disorder  on  my  bodily 
frame  is  unfortunate ;  trouble  brings  on  disease 
and  disorders  the  sleep.  In  this  way  I  am  labor- 
ing a  little  now,  but  not  much;  in  a  few  days 
it  will  pass  away  again.  He  that  hath  delivered 
and  doth  deliver,  is  He  in  whom  we  trust  that 
He  wUl  yet  deliver 

''The  queensware  on  its  way  to  me  can  be 
sold  at  an  outcry  or  sent  to  Corrie.  I  do  not 
want  queensware  or  anything  else  now.  My 
new  house  and  garden,  without  the  person  I  ex- 
pected to  share  it  with  me,  excite  disgust.'' 

On  the  receipt  of  Ly dia  's  letter,  Martyn  wrote 
at  once  to  ask  whether,  if  he  agreed  not  to  urge 
her  to  leave  her  mother,  she  would  consent  to 
an  engagement  ia  order  that  they  might  still 
correspond.  But  she  refused  this  too,  and  bade 
him  a  final  farewell. 

It  broke  Martyn 's  heart  and  cost  her  much 
sorrow.  Why,  then,  did  she  not  go  ?  To  Charles 
Simeon,  who  went  to  intercede  for  his  beloved 
young  friend,  she  gave  four  reasons, — her  health, 
the  indelicacy  of  going  out  to  India  alone  on 
such  an  errand,  her  former  engagement  to  an- 
other man,  and  the  unwillingness  of  her  mother 
to  give  her  consent. 

But  these,  alas !  were  excuses,  rather  than  in- 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attaclunent    73 

surmountable  obstacles.  Had  she  really  wanted 
to  go,  the  first  three  would  have  carried  no 
weight,  and  the  fourth  would  doubtless  have 
yielded  to  prayer  and  persuasion.  Her  diary  is 
full  of  intense  love  and  d'evotion  to  God,  but 
one  may  search  its  pages  in  vain  for  a  single 
sentence  expressing  a  desire  to  join  her  lover  in 
India  and  share  in  his  work.  She  loved  Martyn 
and  she  loved  God,  but  not  enough  to  make  such 
a  sacrifice.  The  poet  probed  deep  into  her  heart 
and  laid  bare  its  secrets  when  he  wrote : 

**The  woman  of  his  Jove 
Feared  to  leave  all  and  give  her  life  to  his, 
And  both  to  God.'' 

Yet  few  dare  blame  her.  Let  those  heroic  souls 
whose  sacrifices  match  those  of  a  Christina  Coil- 
lard  or  an  Ann  Judson  cast  the  first  stone. 

Thus  ended  Henry  Martyn 's  wooing.  But  his 
friends  were  loath  to  let  the  matter  drop.  They 
thought  he  needed  a  wife  and  when  the  sister 
of  his  dear  friend,  the  Rev.  Daniel  Corrie,  came 
to  join  her  brother  in  India  it  was  suggested  that 
perhaps  she  might  be  the  one.  By  and  by  a 
rumor  reached  England  that  they  were  soon  to 
be  married.  Lydia  heard  it  and  was  greatly  dis- 
turb-ed!  Simeon  heard  it  and  wrote  to  David 
Brown  to  confirm  it. 


74   Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

**How  could  you  imagine/'  Brown  wrote 
back,  *'that  Miss  C.  would  do  as  well  as  Miss 
L.  G.  for  Mr.  Martyn  ?  Dear  Martyn  is  married 
already  to  three  wives,  whom  I  believe  he  would 
not  forsake  for  all  the  princesses  on  earth — I 
mean  his  three  translations  of  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures/' 

Ill-health,  lack  of  visible  results,  his  hopeless 
attachment,  and  the  death  of  both  sisters,  leaving 
him  the  last  of  his  family,  filled  Martyn 's  cup 
of  sorrow  full  to  overflowiag,  yet  he  continued 
to  work  without  ceasing.  "When  the  news  of 
the  death  of  his  second  sister  reached  him  in 
March,  1810,  his  grief  was  excessive.  But  Lydia 
now  took  compassion  on  him  and  wrote  offering 
to  take  the  place  of  h-er  who  was  gone.  This 
acted  as  balm  to  his  sorrowing  heart.  * '  My  long- 
lost  Lydia  consents  to  write  to  me,"  he  wrote 
to  David  Brown. 

The  correspondence  that  followed  was  the 
great  solace  of  the  two  weary  years  that  re- 
mained. He  had  given  her  up  but  she  was  ever 
**his  dearest,"  and  the  last  letter  he  wrote  was 
to  her. 

On  October  16,  1812,  when  Martyn  **  burned 
out  for  God"  at  Tokat,  he  was  only  thirty-one. 
Humanly  speaking,  had  Lydia  been  there,  he 
need  not  have  died.  With  a  wife  to  care  for 
and  comfort  and  cheer  him  his  life  might  have 


Handicap  of  a  Hopeless  Attacluneiit    75 

been  lengthened  and  his  service  for  India  great- 
ly prolonged.  *'It  was  the  greatest  calamity  of 
his  whole  career  that  Lydia  did  not  accompany 
him,"  says  Doctor  George  Smith.  *'But  we 
cannot  consider  it  a  'bitter  misfortune/  as  some 
do,  that  he  ever  knew  her.  His  love  for  her 
worked  a  higher  elevation  for  himself  and  gives 
to  his  Letters  and  Journah  an  intense  human 
interest. ' ' 

Lydia  Grenfell  saved  herself;  but  she  cut 
short  and  marred  Martyn's  career,  and  lost  the 
high  honor  of  being  his  wife.  Would  her  de- 
cision be  different,  could  she  come  back  and  live 
her  life  over? 


Printed   in   the   United   States   of  America. 


FOREIGN  MISSIONS  AND  YOUNG  PEOPLE 

BELLE  M.  BRAIN 

Love  Stories  of  Great  Missionaries 

Illustrated,  i2mo,  cloth,  net  50c. 

Miss  Brain  has  made  a  distinct  place  for  herself  in  mis- 
sionary literature.  She  is  preeminently  a  story-teller,  know- 
ing well  how  to  invest  her  subject  with  charm  and  interest. 
In  these  love  stories  of  the  World's  great  missionaries  she  is 
at  her  best.  It  is  evident  from  these  romances  of  Judson 
and  Gilmour  and  Livingstone  and  Moffat  and  Caillard  and 
Martyn,  which  she  portrays  with  such  fascination,  that  love, 
courtship  and  marriage  are  very  vital  factors  in  the  Mission- 
ary Enterprise. 
JULIA    H.   JOHNSTON 

Fifty  Missionary  Heroes  Every  Boy  and 
Girl  Should  Know 

Illustrated,  i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.00. 

The  author  of  that  popular  Mission  Study  Text  Book,  IN- 
DIAN AND  SPANISH  NEIGHBORS,  has  supplied  a  real 
need  in  this  volume  for  Junior  readers  and  leaders.  Miss 
Johnston  gives  living  portraits  of  a  large  number  of  mission- 
ary heroes  well  adapted  to  interest  and  inspire  young  people. 

EMILY  E.  ENTWISTLE 

The  Steep  Ascent 

Missionary  Talks  With  Young  People.  i2mo, 
cloth,  net  $1.00. 

Martha  Tarbell  says  of  the  book,  "It  is  exceedingly  well 
and  interestingly  written,  adapted  to  the  Junior  and  lower 
Intermediate  grades  for  which  so  few  books  of  this  sort  are 
written." 

BASIL  MATHEWS,   M.A. 

The  Splendid  Quest 

Stories  of  Knights  on  the  Pilgrim  Way.  i2mo, 
cloth,  net  $1.00. 

Ite    Prologue,    "The    Pilgrim's    Way,"    serves    as    a    back- 
ground  for  the  life  stories  of   famous   Knights   of  the  Quest 
which  follow.     The  stories  are  suitable  for  children  of  from 
8  to  15. 
REV.   W.   MUNN 

Three  Men  on  a  Chinese  Houseboat 

The  Story  of  a  River  Voyage  Told  for  Young 
Folks.     Illustrated,   i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.00. 

The  story  of  an  actual  trip  up  the  Yang-tse  river  taken  by 
three  missionaries  on  the  way  to  their  stations.  In  breezy, 
easy-flowing  narrative  one  of  the  three  tells  the  very  inter- 
esting story  of  their  fifteen  hundred  mile  journey.  The  book 
should  be  a  very  acceptible  addition  to  missionary  stones 
and  side-light  reading. 


MISSIONARY— BIOGRAPHY 


JOHN  T.  PARIS         Author  of 'Men  Who  Made  Good'' 

The  Alaskan  Pathfinder 

The  Story  of  Sheldon  Jackson  for  Boys.  Illus- 
trated, i2mo,  cloth,  net  $i.oo. 

The  story  of  Sheldon  Jackson  will  appeal  irrcfistibly  to 
every  boy.  Action  from  the  time  he  was,  as  an  infant, 
rescued  from  a  fire  to  his  years'  of  strenuous  rides  through 
the  Rockies  'and  his  long  years'  of  service  in  Alaska,  per- 
meate every  page  of  the  book.  Mr.  Paris,  with  a  sure  hand, 
tells  the  story  of  this  apostle  of  the  Western  Indians  in  clear- 
cut,  incisive  chapters  which  will  hold  the  boy's  attention 
from    first   to    last. 

MRS.  S.  MOORE  SITES 

Nathan  Sites : 

Introduction  by  Bishop  W.  F.  McDowell.  Oriental 
Hand-Painted  Illustrations,  gilt  top,  net  $i-50. 

This  is  one  of  the  notable  books  of  the  year.  China  looms 
large  in  current  political  and  religious  interest,  »o  that  this 
life  story  of  one  who  for  nearly  half  a  century  has  been 
closely  identified  with  social  and  religious  reform  in  that 
country  must  have  a  large  place  in  current  literature. 

G.   L   WHARTON 

Life  of  G.  L.  Wharton 

By  Mrs.  Emma  Richardson  Wharton.  Illustrated, 
i2mo,  gilt  top,  cloth,  net  $1.25. 

A  biography  of  a  pioneer  missionary  of  the  F.  C.  M.  S., 
written  by  a  devoted  wife  who  shared  the  experiences  of 
her  husband  in  a  long  service  in  India  and  Australia.  It  13 
a  life  of  unusual  interest  and  an  important  addition  to  the 
annals  of  modern  missionary  effort. 

MRS.  LAURA  DELANY  GARST 

A  West  Pointer  in  the  Land  of  the 

Mikado 

Illustrated,  i2mo,  cloth,  net  $1.25. 

The  story  of  a  great  life  given  unreservedly  to  the  service 
of  God  in  Japan — a  life  storjr  representative  of  the  best  the 
West  sends  the  East  and  typical  of  that  missionary  spirit  in 
America  which  is  one  of  the  marvelous  things  in  the  growth 
of  the  Christ  life  in  man.  Ihe  Christian  world  will  be  proud 
of  and  wish  to  study  such  a  record — coming  generations 
will  find  here  inspiration  and  incentive  for  yet  greater  ef- 
fort and  larger  sacrifice. 


'illMMlSi;i??,V:,J?,S-y  Li6ra.es 


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